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For the past 17 years, The Filipino Express has provided the Filipino American community the best news, arts and entertainment coverage from around the United States and the Philippines.
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This website includes selected articles from this week's edition of the Filipino Express. Not all the stories published in the printed version appear on this site.
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Jamaica, NEW YORK --- The Filipino American Human Services, Inc. (FAHSI) announced, today, that New York City’s Department of Youth and Community Development (DYCD) has approved a $123,000 multi-year contract to provide continued after-school and summer programs targeting Filipino at-risk youth.
“We are pleased to receive this award during these financially difficult times for many small nonprofits - particularly immigrant-serving CBOs,” said Sherry Lynn Peralta, FAHSI Executive Director.
In 2005, DYCD restructured its federal Community Services Block Grant (CSBG) funding by merging existing programs such as the Youth Development & Delinquency Prevention (YDDP) and releasing a new RFP called the Out-of-School Time, or OST program grant.
The city-wide after-school and summer program will be offered at various public elementary, middle, and high school sites, as well as large non-profit agencies such as Big Brothers Big Sisters of NYC.
FAHSI is one of a handful of nonprofit agencies in Queens to receive the award - providing educational workshops, mentorship programs, college prep workshops, and bilingual counseling services at its community center site in Southeast Queens.
Entitled LYFE (or Leading Youth to Find Empowerment) Program, youth activities are geared towards both Filipino and non-Filipino high school students aged 12 to 18 years old. Volunteers and college interns are also directly involved in organizing community service projects & youth-led events.
“We are investing in the future generations of Filipino Americans,” said Peralta.
FAHSI is a private, non-profit organization established in 1993 to help meet the human service needs of the Filipino American community of New York.
For more information on FAHSI’s programs, contact Vilma Braga, Program Director, at (718) 883-1295 or visit FAHSI online at http://www.fahsi.org.
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Philippine Fiesta 2005 will present the Santakruzan and its participants, to be held at Meadowlands Expo Center, Secaucus, New Jersey on August 21, 2005, Sunday at 1:00am, right after the celebration of the Mass.
The Santakruzan commemorates the search of the Holy Cross by Queen Helena (Reina Elena) and her son, the newly converted Emperor, Constantine. After the Holy Cross was found in Jerusalem and brought back to Rome, there was a joyful celebration of thanksgiving. This festival was introduced by the Spaniards in the Philippines and has since become part of Filipino traditions identified with youth, love and romance. Amid the festive atmosphere, a mass was celebrated on Sunday morning followed by a religious beauty procession.
Santakruzan participants reveled in a Philippine-style Fiesta, reminiscent of the grand traditions back home. This year’s Santacruzan Hermano Mayor is Engr. Rudy Quiambao together with his wife, Dra. Connie Quiambao as the Hermana Mayor.
The Court of the Miss Philippine Fiesta USA 2004, Adrienne Sumallo, will serve as Reina Elenas that include Jennifer Jade Lor, Miss Philippine Fiesta Eastcoast 2004, Bettina Lopez, Miss Philippine Fiesta Luzon 2004, Julieanne Lizo, Miss Philippine Fiesta Visayas 2004 and Cristina McGarry, Miss Philippine Fiesta Mindanao 2004. In addition, little girls and boys will serve as angels, flower girls and escorts all doned in festive costumes. This year’s chairpersons for the Philippine Fiesta 2005 Santacruzan are Rose Javier and Mely Garcia assisted by Rebecca Samanyaphong and Paulette Ong.
The Santacruzan and the celebration of the mass on Sunday, August 21, 2005 is one of the many cultural activities at the Philippine Fiesta, the largest gathering of Filipino Americans on the eastcoast.
Now on its 7th year, the event is sponsored by Northwest Airlines/KLM, Washington Mutual Bank, Western Union, INQ7.net, Citibank, COSTCO, Mama Sita, Garden State Travel, Globalcom.net, VISION and DIRECTV. The Philippine Fiesta supports the P.A.G.E.S. Operation Hope Mission to the Philippines and the ANCOP Foundation Gawad-Kalinga. To sponsor, exhibit, advertise or inquire program schedules, tickets and activities, one may call 212-682-6610, email: sepmgzn@aol.com or visit their website: philippinefiesta.com.
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NEW JERSEY --- Filipino American siblings, who claim their great grandfather, a former Governor General to the Philippines in 1859 who fathered two children of Spain’s Queen Isabel II, have sought the help of the US State Department to certify the authentic testatory will sent by the military archives of Spain.
In a letter to the State Department, Juan Carlos Arevalo, who works for Pentagon; and his businesswoman- sister, Cara Maria Margarita Arevalo; and their Filipino father, Ray Arevalo, cousins of reigning King Juan Carlos l of Spain; want to claim back their legacy and the general’s role in history.
Their legacy was lost when a Filipino widow – Dona Atanacia Bayot – who had seven children, and a son from a previous marriage, married Governor General Juan Martin Arevalo who was then on the brink of death.
She then assigned her son – Francisco – as the sole executor of the Governor’s monetary estate and gold from Spain – at the expense of his sole surviving inheritor, Don Julio, the grandfather of Ray Arevalo.
The Arevalos claim that the Bayot family defrauded the Arevalos by misrepresenting them to claim the Governor’s properties and royal gold military pension - or Escudos - from Spain which are still being sent by the Spanish government from 19th century up to this time.
The Arevalos said they are the direct descendants of the late Governor General.
The Governor General was murdered in the Philippines in 1864 after Atanacia Bayot, bore him a son, Julio Martin Arevalo.
Because of the “gold Escudos” from Spain, the Bayot family became the most landed, wealthiest family in Masbate, Philippines and acquired properties in the US.
Ray Arevalo also discovered last year, that their grandfather left a vast winery and other properties in Spain for his heirs.
“With the Spanish influence on land-grabbing in the Philippines and the power of the rich trampling the rights of the poor, we believe that a heavy case of transgressions, force and manipulations transpired during the time of our great grandfather, Don Julio,” the heirs said.
The Arevalo heirs discovered their royal lineage through extensive records such as letters from the Queens of Spain, military records, department of Army , Supreme Court and Justice Ministry from the Spanish archives of Segovia, Spain.
The Governor received the Order of San Hermenegildo Award, the highest award given to someone with outstanding royal and military contribution to Spain. the award came from Queen Isabel . He toppled the insurgency in Fort Santiago, Intramuros and received another award of distinction. The Governor was Spain’s biggest military star in the 1850s.
Cara Arevalo, her mother Caroll and father Ray, are in the Philippines right now to trace back the history of their great grandfather.
In an earlier interview, the Arevalo family said after the State Department certification, the Bayot clan would be forced to return the stolen properties of the Arevalos.
The Arevalos have yet to decide whether to file a criminal complaint against the Bayot family for fraud, deception, and misrepresentation.
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