WonderWomen

We flew to the TOP!:)

To the ladies of WonderWomen, Thank you for an amazing semester. We may have had our differences througout the semester, in the end, we came together and excelled in our projects. Every moment with you ladies was so much fun! Who said that the all womens’ group wouldn’t function? I think we worked out perfectly. I am glad to say that Im happy I was stuck with you all this semester. I don’t regret anything and if I can repeat this experience, I want you guys all in it :) Thank you for putting up with me and bearing with my busy schedule. You guys are amazing individuals words cannot even explain. Please let’s keep in touch and have reunions okay? ;) Love you ladies! =]

TO THE WHOLE ETHS210 CLASS, IRENE DULLER, & TAs! :) Thank you for sharing this experience with me. This class definitely is something I would never forget! I am glad that I took this class, and I am glad that I took it with each and everyone of you guys! We may still not know each others’ names, but whatever, we know our experience, and only we can know how it felt. :) We excelled this semester, and so good job everyone! TAs! Thank you for guiding us in everyway you can. You guys have helped us in a lot of ways, and we couldn’t have done it without your help! To Irene, you are the best teacher!! You are so cool,amazing, and such an inspiriation! :) Thank you for being such a role model. You are a definition of Strong Pinay & I hella look up to you!

I’ll miss you all!
Much loves<3

-Bianca Ilagan

**This was sent at 12:03. Oh c’mon, let it pass :) hahaa

POP! Time of our lives!

Daaang, where’d the semester go? We got through ETHS210. Remember the first couple of weeks where everyone was STRUGGLING to get into the class, and STRUGGLING to bring chairs for everyone. Being individuals, we eventually became a community. the ETHS210 community…Irene Duller’s class.

We had our Iron Chef, Project Runway, Midterm, and damn FINAL!

P.roducting O.ur P.ower. POP was such an amazing show. Once again, it was very stressful getting everyone together to put together the show. I was part of the dance committee as well as the Music/Spoken word community. I was more focused, however, on the dance committee. Thanksgiving break passed and we had nothing in our plate. I was really nervous, but I stayed positive. I said that we will pull it off and everything was going to be okay. I really liked our theme though, Heritage & Identity. The dance committee had a bunch of ideas, that didn’t really go through. Once again, we all came together to produce a community show.

The dance committee wanted to showcase different dances that showed the different eras…to show heritage. So we had traditional, Jazz/lyrical, and Hiphop. I was part of traditional where we did a traditional Japanes dance called the Obon dance, and a Filipino traditional dance called Singkil. It was stressful to learn the dance and teach, in addition, we didnt have everyone there.

The day before the final, we supposedly had a mandatory practice at Mike’s house in Westlake. However, not everyone showed up, but we still made good use of our time. We practiced and choreographed our skit (Party in the USA) and did run throughs. We had hella fun and hella laughs that day. I think it was all our nervousness and anxiety missed with excitement. It was definitely crunch time, but having fun kept us sane. By the end of the day, Dance commitee became skit & aesthetics committees too because of our storyline & props. I am damn proud of everyone! :)

The day of the show came, and we didn’t even watch the other classes’ performance because dance was practicing in the room the entire time. We really wanted ours to be perfect. IT WAS HELLLA FUN to be up on stage with these people. Our “Party in the USA” performance was the bomb. Well, I hpoe someone has a video. But yeah, it was good. :) Im proud of everyone!

Thank you guys for an amazing Final! :)

-Bianca Ilagan

He’s the champ!

I love love love going being around my family whenever there’s a Pacquiao fight going on. My family gets crazy, and if people don’t know what’s going on, they might think there’s an actual fight going on in the house because everyone’s shouting, stomping and whatnot. If you have ever been around Filipinos during a Pacman fight, you all should know what I am talking about.

Manny “Pacman” Pacquaio is the champion. He never fails to amaze and make the Filipino people proud. He just wants to bring the title all the time right? This is another moment where I’m damn proud to say that I am Filipino. If there was one thing that we are recognized for (finally) that is boxing. Thank you Manny for showing the world that Filipinos are effin’ amazing, too!

You’re a champion in bringing people together too. This is one of the times where everyone gathers to watch together. People may have hella big parties too just to watch your fight. Damn, Manny, that’s how big you are and that’s how much we support our own people. Can’t wait for the next fight in March!! Pacquiao Vs. Mayweather. GET IT! :)

CNN Hero of the Year.

Gangs, little did we all know, do exist in the Philippines. Gang members are trained as young as 9 years old in the slums. Most of the people in gangs are victims of Poverty.

Who knew that being bullied by gangs would be an inspiration for someone. Efren Penaflorida was bullied by gangs during his High School days. However, he didn’t take this as a bad thing, but rather as an inspiration to make a change. He knew firsthand what poor children went through. Efren was born into a poor family, but this did not stop him create his beautiful future.

He wants to create a change and help the poor children have a better life. He doesn’t want these children going astray into gangs and wasting something that can be beautiful. Today he offers Filipino youth an alternative to gang membership by educating them. He gathers volunteers to help him teach the youth. He says that if the youth was given education, then this will take their minds off being a gang. He felt the need of giving the opportunity to learn. He teaches them to read, write, do Math, and English. He even offers hygene classes.

He has made a huge impact and changed many youths’ life. Because of him, some of the youth have thought twice about joining a gang, and rather pursuing something and continue with his education.

So on November 22, 2009, he was awarded CNN Hero of the Year.

DAMN, It’s one of those moments where I can truly say that I am proud to be Filipino. Simply amazing.

“I always tell my volunteers that you are the change that you dream and I am the change that I dream. And collectively we are the change that this world needs to be.” - Efren Penaflorida

This shall be an inspiration for me and everyone else.

-Bianca Ilagan

COREageous!

Pilipino American Collegiate Endeavor (PACE)

About 7 months ago, I was scared to turn in a piece of paper that would probably change my life… my CORE bio. It was a really hard decision to turn in that paper because I was not sure if I was ready for it. 5pm of that day came, and it was due. With the help of some people, they convinced me to just GO FOR IT. Hella scared, I turned it in, and the next thing I know, I was in front of many people, past coordinators, and just general members for debates. I was frightened, I knew I was in for a lot of questions, critical questions that may determine whether I get this position or not. I was running for Community Coordinator, but before that, I had a bio for Internship Coordinator, then Executive Assistant. But I ended up with Community.

I got the position, and trust me, I was still scared like EFF! I really wanted to quit already because I knew I was in for a ride. There was a lot of work to be done in the summer in preparation for the semester. Core retreat came, and 12 individuals were trained to work together. It was very interesting…the activities were so unexpected. I can say I came out of that retreat stronger and more confident…but still scared.

I went through 10 weeks of internship, sharing my knowledge to Interns about the Filipino community and this affects their identities and culture. I help them open up their eyes to the real issues going on in the community and what they can do about it. WE are the ones who can create a change, so do something about it. I guided them as they pushed themselves to be vulnerable and open up to try to love and trust each other to strengthen their own internship community. And as the last week came, I was damn proud of the Fall 09 Interns. I can see that they have grown and have really treasured what they have learned through Internship. I was glad to have shared that experience with them, and also giving me a chance to grow with them.

I’m half way done with this Journey. I have definitely grown a lot. However, I don’t think I could have done any of this without the help of my fellow Coordinators. Shoutout to Bea, Andrew, Missy, Kharyl, Jon, Sunny, Jean, Ryan, Josh, Carina, & Ben. Thank you guys for always having a helping hand for me. Thank you for believing in me and never doubting me. Thank you for trusting me. Thank you for being my friend, and thank you for the memories. WE ARE PROUD OF OURSELVES, but I am proud to say that I am glad to be sharing this adventure with you guys! Through all the names we tried to come up with, we ended up with COREageous, cause damn right we are courageous. We are all hella young, but damn we makin’ a difference! :) One more semester, so let’s make it the best! I love you guys, forever!

-Bianca Ilagan

“What’s goin’ on? O_o”

Were the words that came out of people’s mouths during our flashmob for our Midterm. Damn, the process for this midterm was crazy because it’s so hard to get everyone together to learn a dance, therefore, it was so late minute. We didn’t even perfect the dance till the hour before. But oh man, was it all worth it in the end!

At first, I wasn’t sure of how everything would turn out. The idea of a flashmob was so exciting and something that I’ve always wanted to do before. When Irene had dropped the bomb on us that we were to do a flashmob for our midterm, my eyes lit up and I wanted to get on it! Little did I know how stressful it was going to be given the amount of time we really had. I think the down side of this class is the meeting times. I wish we had more days in the week for this class rather than once a week.

So Shoutout to Terri, Lynchel (sp?), and Jeff for choreographing the dance. I know it’s not easy to create a dance so quick and actually teach it to us in such a short amount of time! It was cool that we get to dance to Michael Jackson’s “Smooth Criminal”. It was a chance to honor the King of Pop.

The day of the final came, and we still didn’t know where the hell we were doing our presentations! Although I have heard that it was off campus, I was still anxious to know where it would be exactly. We then gathered and we found out that we were to dance in three destinations: Malcolm X, Castro Street, and Powell. I was scared as hell, especially the ones off campus. This was definitely something new. I felt that it was going to be awkward to randomly dance in the street. But when it all came down, it was hella fun and it was a suceess! Even if we messed up HELLA much, I think the most important thing was that we had fun, and we lived up to our theme: Solidarity & Unity.. because this midterm definitely brought us all together, no matter who we were.

*PS. Just a note, wish you guys would have told us to at least bring 2 dollars so we weren’t panicking and stressing about getting cash right before! haha :) kaay, that’s it!

Goood Job ya’ll! :)

-Bianca Ilagan

Fashion Show! Ayeee!

I love how this class has a different structure than any other class. I love how we are able to learn by ourselves and present those information to the class in a very unique and creative way. Our project runway unit definitely gave us the chance to explore and be creative while learning and presenting important information.

Our task was to present a political/community issue about an assigned country and put that issue into fashion. We were to modernize traditional clothing as well as incorporate the issue into that ensemble.

WonderWomen was to present a political/community issue about the Philippines. As much as there are so many issues continuously occuring in the Philippines, at that moment the biggest issue was the hit of typhoon Ondoy. You may see it not be a politcal issue, but it was a big community issue that affected millions of people. We took the traditional Maria Clara (for the women) and modernized it by making it into a mini skirt typa thing. We used earthy materials because it was a natural disaster. So we had leaves and rice. We used an umbrella as a skirt to represent the typhoon itself. We had used aluminum materials for jewelry to represent the houses damaged. The show said Balikbayan Box on it to represent the relief effort that everyone was doing, all over the world.

This typhoon affected many lives and many of them had to start all over again. Many of the Filipino people need to spend money to get their houses fixed and buy new materials & furniture. We have to acknowledge though the help that everyone has been givin’ to the Philippines.

Good Job with workin’ that Runwaay Cindy!! :) You did great. Good Job Ladies! I think we presented our information well and we worked hard on the product. I apologize though for my lack of presence in the process, I just had a LOT of stuff going on. But yeah, good job :)

-Bianca Ilagan

car accident

ok I can’t right anymore blogs sorry! Because i just got into a car accident and blogs are due in like an hour. Sorry, this is what i get for procrastinating. =(

POP!POP!POP!POP!

I just want to say congratulations to everyone for doing so well at our POP show!. Preparing for this final was very difficult. After coming back from Thanksgiving we were informed that we were to get together and come up with a thirty minute show. I was a bit irritated because it seemed to be somewhat unorganized when we met and tried to brainstorm about what we were going to do. When we got into our separate groups it was confusing because my group (the script group) had to wait on what the other groups wanted to incorporate in the show before we could decide what we were all going to do or perform. Luckily by the end of the class we were able to pull together with a rough sketch about what our show was going to be about.

When the day came for our final I was really nervous because we haven’t got the opportunity to meet together. Watching the other classes and their performances really gave me much more confidence. Just seeing how high energy every one was when they got on stage just made me more excited about what we were going to show to our fellow audience. Seeing EVERYONE on stage and share their talents with all of us was really inspiring. I wish that I got the opportunity to get to know everyone else in our class. The past few classes spending time with one another gave us all the opportunity to work with each other and get to know each other. It was nice coming together for this one purpose. It made me feel strong about our performance. I am so happy that its over and done with, but I am a bit sad that I won’t get to see everyone every Wednesday. I just want to say Thank You to my group Wonder Women, you ladies have worked so hard for our group and I really enjoyed working with each and everyone of you.

-Natasha Hernandez

Everything I Tried to Remember to Say

This class was no doubt unlike any other class that I have taken or thought I would have taken in college. Quite honestly, this class is one of the reasons why I love San Francisco State sometimes. Instead of essays we are able to write blogs, Asian American Iron Chef, Project Runway, our flash mob midterm, and POP show as our final were things that I would never have gotten to experience if it were not for the existence of this class. I will never forget the things that I have gone through and I am proud to say that because of this class, I have learned to become a better leader. I know that in the four corners game I placed myself in the leader corner due to my past leadership roles, but I truly believe that due to this classes assignments, I have grown as a person, as a leader, and as a team member.

To the HolyRollers, Alligatoreaters, Asian Ice, Sophs and the LoLo, Go Bots, What the Pho? and Starjellies, it was a pleasure having a class with such creative and strong minded individuals. Though I was not able to meet each and everyone of you, I am proud to be a part of a class such as ours. Good job everyone and good luck on your future endeavors. 

To the TAs also known as our mentors, thank you for guiding us into the right direction and providing us with the information we needed. Coming from the Wonderwomen I would like to send out a special thanks to Brian Ignacio, though you think that you did nothing for us, you definitely provided us with a helping hand. You provided us with a phone number to call or text whenever we were in a jam. Don’t think that you did nothing for us, because in our eyes you did more than enough. I am glad that you were my TA because on a personal level, it was a chance for me to create a closer friendship with you and for that I am thankful.

Irene Duller, there really is not another teacher such as yourself. Being that I am not an Asian American Major I do not necessarily get to surround myself with teachers like you and get to endulge myself with classes such as your Ethnic Studies 210 class so I find myself lucky to have received a permit number to add this class this semester. Thank you for being there with an open mind when I presented you with my concerns and thank you for being such a diverse individual. You know exactly when to be in “teacher mode” and when you are able to be more laid back in order to have a deeper connection with your students. Creating your assignments and carrying out your class in the way you do must not be easy but I am thankful for the fact that you are willing to think out of the box and through trial and error, continually come closer to perfection. To sum it all, the class was amazing, you are an amazing teacher, thank you.

And last but not least, to my fellow Wonderwomen I would like to present this message to you all that it has been nothing else but a pleasure to work with each and every one of you. I love how we are all dorks and have a sense of humor that even the toughest jobs can seem fun when we’re all together. Let’s be honest, there were times where I asked a lot from you guys and none of you complained. I was truly blessed with such a hardworking group, you guys really strived for perfection and I could not have asked for more. If I had the chance to do this process all over again I would not have it any other way. You guys are all so intelligent, creative, passionate, talented, and the list goes on. I don’t know what else to say other than I am proud of you guys and what we have accomplished as a team. I am truly impressed by every one of you and from the bottom of my heart I would like to say that I have love for this group and for you all.

Wonderwomen, ready to fly to the top!

- Jhesmine Policar

Pinayism

Being an active member of PACE I decided to join their Pinayism workshop for this years fall interns. I was a Fall Intern in 2008. Shout out to ENTOURAGE! =) Although I have experienced Pinayism in my previous learning of Fall 2008, this years workshop was really intense and life changing. This workshop in particular made me want to change many of my male friends. I have many male friends and the topics and issues that we discussed in the workshop made me think of them and their views on not just pinays but women in general. If you are planning on taking a class next semester and have not experienced PACE internship, you should definitely do it! I highly recommend you join this internship. Not only do you learn about important and life changing topics like Pinayism but you get the opportunity to meet new people and create a close bond with one another. If it wasn’t for this internship I wouldn’t have learned about my culture and history. All the activities that we all partook in really changed my outlook in life. So please join! You don’t have to be Filipino to join its open to everyone. Even if you don’t need the units the workshops take place every semester. Just visit the PACE office in the Cesar Chavez center.

-Natasha Hernandez

Sushi Anyone?

Today me and my friend Gabriel decided to go get some sushi! =) I love sushi so much. There are certain days were I crave for sushi and today was definitely one of them. We decided to go to Barracuda. A sushi restaurant in Daly City right next to Serramonte Mall. There was various types of sushi rolls to chose from on the menu. I couldn’t seem to come to a decision about what sushi I would partake in. Then I noticed that names of the rolls. My question is, who names rolls at sushi restaurants? And How do they come to get these names? Anyways, one of their rolls were named “Manila”. Right when I saw that name I immediately thought about the Philippines. Since Manila is the capitol of the Philippines and one of the most busiest cities in the Philippines.

I thought to myself why it would be named Manila roll? After contemplating about the possible resolutions to this answer I realized that Daly City has a high population of Filipinos. Growing up in the east bay, in a predominately white and black community, it was very rare to come across a Filipino restaurant. I remember going to only one Filipno restaurant and before I knew it the place was shut down within a couple of months. When I came here to the city I realized of how much of my Filipino heritage seeped in the city. Going on Daly City bart I would notice billboards and advertisements with TFC (The Filipino Channel) shows. I even noticed words in Tagalog (the language of the Philippines) on billboards such as Mcdonalds. These things I thought I would never ever see here in America because of how much I felt like a minority growing up . Realizing how much of my Filipino heritage is noticeable here really makes me feel happy because growing up I didn’t see much of it.

-Natasha Hernandez

SOLIDARITY & UNITY

For our midterm our goal was to go out into the world as guerrillas. Before we actually started the process of this midterm, I was a bit hesitant to to what we were going to come up with. However, when we started practices for the dance I began to have a lot more faith. Preparing for our midterm was a lot more exciting because I felt that this was the first project that our class actually got to work together as a class instead of individual groups. Though I love our individual groups it was fun to interact with other classmates. This midterm was the first time that I really felt united.

When the day finally came to perform I did not know what to expect. I was nervous yet anxious at the same time. The first time we performed on campus I felt very excited because I was thinking to myself “wow these students don’t even know what is going to occur within the next three minutes.” After our first performance was done I felt that we could have done a better job at deciding what way we were all going to face because as we approached our second outdoor setting the same thing happened to us. We all faced different directions and it was a bit confusing. I felt that the meaning had lost it because we were all unsure of which way to face. But when the third performance came I already knew that it was our time to redeem ourselves from the last two performances.

When we reached Powell station I found it amusing when people who were not apart of our class came up to me and ask “why are there so many students”. At this time I was off sitting by myself trying not to associate myself with my other fellow classmates because after all I was to pretend as if nothing was going to occur. I simply said to them “oh I don’t know, I didn’t even noticed” At that moment I knew that that our group was going to successfully execute our goal that we came to accomplish. After the whole thing was over and we passed out our lanyards I felt so overwhelmed with joy and relief. We had finally did it and the people that were witnessing got the message we were trying to portray. Good job to everyone! I am so proud of what we accomplished!! =)

-Natasha Hernandez

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I hope you guys all enjoyed your turkey day! I know I  did =) Having this week off was really relaxing and I enjoyed it a little too much. Too much to the point that I am not in school mode so much =/ but other than that my Thanksgiving was really enjoyable. I always adore it when the holidays come around cause it only means one thing and one thing only! That its family time! I have a very large amount of relatives that live in the bay area. Though we do not see each other as much as we would like to due to our hectic schedules, we never fail to miss out on holiday celebrations with the family.

At my Thanksgiving lunch we had two turkeys! My parents hosted this years Thanksgiving and our dining table was filled with lots of food for everyone to enjoy. This year was my first year experiencing drinking alcohol with my family and my elders because I just recently turned 21! I discovered that I am not so much a red wine drinker, at least not yet. I guess I have not grown to love the taste. But I did fall in love with the dessert wine that was present at our Thanksgiving. (Maybe because dessert wines are sweet, and I have a sweet tooth. Haha!) But it was kind of weird having my Dad offer me alcohol cause that never happens. Every Thanksgiving me and my cousins take billions of pictures to add to our cousin album online and we also try to plan to do a cousin outing in the evening.

This year some of the cousins and I decided to go black Friday shopping at the Great Mall in San Jose. Great Mall opened at midnight that evening and we decided to attend this soon to be crowded, hectic, crazy black Friday. I thought that I was going to be able to survive but it turned out that once I got there and discovered the hundreds of people trying to shop as well, I felt like giving up. Being there for less than fifteen minutes just made me feel like not shopping at all. I tried to get good deals on shoes but every girl had my shoe size already so the only sizes left were the big ones. I only purchased two things that whole three hours I was there. But, I am glad I experienced it especially since I got to spend some quality, hectic, shopping time with the best cousins ever! Here are some pictures from my Thanksgiving! I hope you all enjoyed your Thanksgiving, and Christmas is just around the corner! I can’t wait =)

-Natasha Hernandez

MANNY PACQUIAO

Being Filipino you don’t really see many artist and musicians out there in America’s media. But when it comes to boxing there is one Filipino who stands out through it all. His name is Manny the Pac Man Pacquiao!!! (If you didn’t know already) But I went home to watch the Pacquiao versus Cotto fight and I was really excited for it because I wasn’t able to watch his last two fights. So I went home to my parents house because they were hosting the fight and all my aunties and uncles and cousins and what nots all came over to watch the fight.

When the fight started was when I really felt proud. Just hearing the Philippine’s national anthem on national television for the world to see, filled me up with so much pride. It is so crazy how this gentlemen who is nationally known for being one of the best boxers in the world is Filipino and represents his Filipino pride very well and proudly. Seeing this fight just gave me a sense of hope. Filipino’s are so talented in so many ways that I wish that more Filipino’s could make it out there not only boxing but basketball, football, and especially music. Watching Manny do his thing in the ring, give future Filipino generations hope for our race in exploding in such categories.

So, before the fight my family and I always bet on rounds. We bet on which rounds Manny will knock the other opponent out. (I mean what Filipino family doesn’t do this routine every time a Manny Pacquiao fight is to occur) It was hilarious witnessing my Aunties and Uncles scream up and down, yelling on the top of their lungs so they can watch him knock out Cotto in the round they bet on. I was sitting there enjoying the fight and paying attention to how intense it was and then I stopped and looked around and just started laughing because I’ve never seen my elders scream and get so ridiculously loud like that.

This is another thing that I love about Manny Pacquiao, his fights really bring people together. When his fights are on, I know that a lot of my Filipino peers are with a group of their family member or closest friends yelling at the television screen just like my family and my group of friends. After experiencing this with my family, I’m never going to miss out on a pacquiao fight ever again. It was so much fun!

-Natasha Hernandez