Join Paul Jochico as he amplifies the voices of Filipino/x folks in the health and wellness space, and builds community across the diaspora. We will use the indigenous Filipino wisdom of kapwa, or shared inner self, to inspire and remember that we are all connected. By sharing our stories we can better see ourselves in each other and be inspired to live life in kapwa.

Subscribe now for updates and learn more about us at @kapwa.yoga and our website.

Matthew "Matty" Espino is an 800-hour+ certified yoga and movement instructor/teacher trainer with specialties in trauma-informed vinyasa yoga, yin, and restorative yoga. Additionally, he has completed training and speciality certifications with Kids & Teens Yoga, Mindfulness Meditation, Yoga Tune Up®, Accessible Yoga, and 305 Fitness Dance Cardio.

Originally from California, Matty moved to New York City in 2013 to pursue his MA in TESOL at Columbia University. During a rather difficult time in his life, he was brought to his first NYC yoga class that opened his curiosities to the potential benefits of yoga and wellness. Ultimately, the practice changed his life. He became yoga certified in the summer of 2015 and began teaching that same year. As part of the few Filipino teachers in the yoga/wellness scene, Matty is committed to representing and fighting for an equitable voice in an industry that is often fraught with invisibilizing and marginalizing those who do not fit a popularized mold. In his commitment to teaching, he aims to cultivate an enriching experience that offers students the ability to feel empowered, seen, and in charge of their own unique experience.

You can connect with Matty on IG @supermatt1123 and through his website. He is offering a Resilience & Rest training starting Oct 14th and has classes on demand through his patreon.

Jewel Sales is a queer Filipinx artist, feminist, personality, and activist. Originally from New York, grew up in Old Bridge, NJ, and now residing in Los Angeles.

Jewel’s work embodies body positivity, feminism, and queer representation. As a queer artist, she felt a sense of urgency to create safe spaces and has been inspired by making people feel a sense of connectedness.

Jewel noticed the LGBTQ+ community didn’t have enough nightlife options other than drinking and clubbing. That's when “Paint and Sip with Jewel” was born. She started to host her own BIPOC + queer paint workshops, as an alternative safe space, colliding art and community.

Jewel's art is available in-person Sundays at Silver Lake Flea and online through her website. Her art will be featured at Barkada Night Market Oct 24th and she is offering a Pumpkin Paint & Sip event on Oct 30th.

You can connect with Jewel on IG through her personal and art accounts, and come join us for an IG Live aftershow with Jewel Oct 26th on @kapwa.yoga!

Marie Lloyd Paspe originally from Singapore, Toronto, and Boston, is a Filipina-American multidisciplinary dancer, singer, choreographer, and concept creator in Queens, NYC. Marie currently performs and tours with @billtjonesarniezaneco based in Chelsea, NYC, choreographs her own works for stage and film, and teaches pilates. She has danced for Carolyn Dorfman, Renee Jaworski, Jae Mann Joo, and performed with @alvinailey Dance Theater. Marie graduated summa cum laude in Dance and Business from @fordhamuniversity /Ailey 2016.⁣

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Using deconstructive designs, vocals, projections, textures, and abstraction; Marie creates with a matriarchal world in mind and a reclamative story that unfolds. Eastern heritage versus Western dance technique pose dissonant synchronicities that show up as painfully pleasurable ironies, reflecting both her Filipinx identity and its colonization. Her interests in dancemaking are deeply tied to making sense of Philipine identity within foreign spaces, and how juxtapositions of contemporary and traditional worlds can meet to learn from each other. ⁣

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Marie’s work has been presented in Israel at Zichri Theater; various theaters such as @dixonplace, @queenstheatre, Ailey Citigroup Theater, Reeds Arboretum, and Smush Gallery in NYC and New Jersey; and commercial work online for most recently EBY and @titovlabel.

Marie is offering a weekly movement class called Structure + Integration that explores the different myofascial meridians of our bodies and how they integrate, relate, and respond to each other. You can connect with Marie on IG @mmmlloyd and through her website.

An LA native dedicated to staying in the Lenape Territory for awhile. Melani De Guzman is a Filipinx-American multidisciplinary dance artist, actor, educator, community facilitator, and healer. The heart of her work is rooted in healing, sensual embodiment, and reclaiming ancestral lineages. She has integrated her diverse practices and collaborative partnerships into site-specific solo works, dance films, and movement offerings.

Melani reclaims her power and truth studying somatic movement practices, mysticism through astrology, community activism, and forever being a student. Her evolving purpose is to create potent and inspiring medicine- projects, initiatives, works, spaces, movements- to help elevate the way all bodies exist.

Melani's offerings include a Bahala Na breathwork and meditation pop up through wuwu, free weekly 30 min somatic meditation exploration at Rose, an in-person sound bath Fridays at Fotografiska NYC, and a collaboration with visual artist Florence Montmare starting Dec 11 onwards. You can connect with Melani on IG @breathemelani and through her website.

Paolo Española is a wandering diner in search of a good meal and an ever-elusive identity. He started this blog during his soul-crushing stint as an accountant and later co-founded Hidden Apron, his side project that dabbles in everything from catering, hosting pop-up dinners, podcasting, and everywhere in between. He is also a contributing author to the best-selling cookbook, “The New Filipino Kitchen”. ⁣

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He believes that food is a universal language that can solve the world’s most challenging problems, help people believe in their own potential, create communities with shared stories, and realize that in breaking bread, we break boundaries. ⁣

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Connect with him on Instagram @errant_diner, over e-mail (theerrantdiner@gmail.com), or through @hidden_apron. He has over five years of experience in strategic and operational roles in the tech industry and is always open to opportunities at the intersection of food, agriculture, and technology.

Kimberly is the chef and co-founder of Kora, an apartment-based bakery born during the COVID-19 pandemic that explores the richness of Filipino culture & flavors through cuisine and her late grandmother’s recipes. She is an alumna of the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York with pastry & savory NYC restaurant experience for teams like Make it Nice and USHG. Kimberly is a proud Filipino-American and Queens-native.

Connect with Kimberly on Instagram @kimberlymcamara, follow Kora @fromkora to find out how to place an order, and check out the Eater article that started it all. Join us Monday evening (12/21) for an IG Live aftershow over at @kapwa.yoga.

Note: we will be taking a break for the holidays and will be back with our next konversation mid-Jan. In the meantime, stay safe and happy holidays!

We are back and want to share this bonus grounding guided meditation for the new year. Inspired by a recent trip to Hawaii, we use the visualization of the mountain as a reminder that strength and stability lies within.

We'll be back with our next Konversation later this week. In the meantime, you can stay connected with us on IG at @kapwa.yoga.

Thank you, Maraming Salamat, and catch you on the next Konversation!