The disconnection from people in my country of birth, the feeling of rootlessness as I draft around from place to place, and the occasional fear that I may never find a place I belong and will forever remain a stranger — all lead me to the question: Where is home? What is home?
(Home is ‘집’ in Korean. If you look closely, you can see the shape of a house with a roof. Then is home simply where one resides?)

From the time I left my ‘home’ until this October travelling to Sweden and Denmark, I think I have been searching for a word I didn’t even know I was missing — diaspora. It made all sense of my constant rootless feeling and made me laugh that I found the language of diaspora in places I had never been to before. Through the character Sage, a girl who seems to belong nowhere and her collective memories of ‘home’, 2023 October’s JapDa aims to depict people on their own journey to find ‘home’. At the end of the film, the magic key disappears, and Sage sets off to an unknown destination. No one knows where she is going, but she will continue walking. At times she will feel lonely but at other times she will feel at home, and that is what keeps her moving forward.

a film by Jin Ok
a poem by Ebba Jonsson

special thanks to
Kajsa Eklund
Helen Knutsson & Lars Eklund
Anette Helmuth

Ebba Jonsson is an actress based in Sweden, who also has a strong passion for writing.