Nanny who inspired Cannes film found

MANILA, Philippines - An Ilongga nanny who was the inspiration for a Singaporean film that won an award at the Cannes Film Festival this year was located by the media at her home in Iloilo Sunday.

Teresita Sajonia, 55, was the nanny named “Auntie Terry” in the full-length film “Ilo Ilo” of Singaporean independent film director Anthony Chen.

The film won the Camera d’Or prize (Best First Film) at the recent Cannes Film Festival, and Chen is the first Singaporean to win the award.

Sajonia worked with the Chen family in
Singapore for eight years in the early 1990s until the financial crisis hit the region, forcing her employers to drop her services.

She was only 30 when she flew to Singapore and worked with the Chens.

Auntie Terry was successfully located by DyFM Bombo Radyo in Sitio Unas, Barangay Santa Cruz, San Miguel town Saturday night and media groups went to her place Sunday morning.

Interest in locating Sajonia grew after Chen revealed what and who inspired him to make the movie Ilo Ilo – a moving story about a Singaporean family and their nanny.

Sajonia is married but has no children. She is a midwifery graduate.

She now sells fruits and vegetables in San Miguel.

Sajonia said she did not expect her life in Singapore would inspire one of the three Chen boys she took care of to someday make a film about it.

She said she would like to see the Chen family again if given a chance.

“The movie is very much inspired by my childhood years,” Chen, 29, told the Malaysian electronic newspaper The Sun.

“When I was young, we had a Filipino maid who was with us for eight years. We called her Auntie Terry,” he said.

Set in Singapore in the 1990s, the film revolves around how one dysfunctional family interacted with their Filipina maid Teresa (played by Filipina indie actress Angeli Bayani), who left her homeland in search of “greener pastures.”

But it is hard being in a faraway land where one is not accustomed to the culture, thus her rapport with her employers is nowhere near intimate – at first.

Eventually, she develops a motherly bond with the troublesome Jale (played by young actor Koh Jia Ler) whom she is bound to take care of.

Chen confesses he belonged to a generation of Singaporeans who were reared with the help of Filipino hands.

“When Auntie Terry returned (to the Philippines) for good, it was hard to bear,” he said. “Eventually, we got used to her absence and somehow lost contact. The one thing that stayed with me after all these years is the name of the place she was from – Iloilo.”