“Dear home,
What’s the one thing you would have me pack in the suitcase to always remember you?”
Within Her Suitcase: A Voyage of Women Immigrant Exhibition, an interactive corner titled "Letters to Home" was introduced. Visitors were invited to pause, take up a pen, and compose letters addressed to a country, a family, or a memory that continued to resonate. What was intended as a simple space for reflection unfolded into a deeply moving exchange.
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Letters were written that carried readers across borders and generations: childhood memories from the Philippines, India, Korea, and Hong Kong. Recollections of food lovingly prepared, lullabies once sung, and rituals whose scents never faded were shared.
​Some letters were marked by joy and gratitude, while others carried the ache of distance, voicing what had been left behind. One particularly poignant letter came from a visitor reflecting on her childhood in the Philippines, where the uncertainty of home and identity was articulated:
"Home has become an unknown place for me. As an immigrant, I am questioning where home really is. It is Canada or is it the Philippines? Even if I have lived in Canada for quite some time, I still see myself as a young Filipina child roaming and running in the rivers and mountains of my hometown.
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I do love Canada but my identity is unclear and I am confused. I love it here but I miss "home". But I don't know where it is anymore. I hope I find out one day. For now, if there's one thing I would pack in the suitcase to remember home, it would be seashells and dried flowers from the same field I used to run to."
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- an excerpt from the letter written by a vistor
The resonance of such words was echoed with Cheng herself, whose own coastal origins carried similar impressions of sea breeze, displacement, and the constant negotiation of belonging.
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The letters, later displayed in half-transparent envelopes, allowed private words to be shared openly while still holding intimacy. Individually, each letter carried a singular narrative; collectively, they formed a chorus of voices. Intimate expressions made visible in a public space, echoing collective feelings of memory, loss, and homelessness.
