FIESTA FILIPINAS 2012 It seem like only yesterday when the first Fiesta Filipinas happened and here we are again gearing up to {as evident by last years success} a much more successful event with perhaps doubling up our exhibitors and sponsors to this event. The potentials for public exposure was such that the politicians with the likes of Andrea Horwath NDP leader, the mayor then Fred Eisenberger , MPP Dave Christopherson, Councilor Tom Jackson, ------- Banham  made themselves available with gracious praises to the success of this event. Definitely they will avail themselves again in May 27th, 2012.  The free affair will start  at 12: 00 noon to 8:30 pm on Sunday May 27, 2012  Bring the whole family. First off you will be greeted by our exhibitor with wares from our old country and more then there is the distinct smell of home made Filipino comfort food. This you have to taste as soon as you are able to for they are known to run out of choice food. Singing contest comes next, folk dancing from the Filipino school and from the Senior dancers    CLICK PHOTO TO VIW AD

	Hill Park Gym Open to PBA Contact: Raffy Rebamontan (email: Rafaelrebamontan @ gmail.com) Details: Practice/pick up basketball at Hill Park Gym from 2:00 pm to 6:00 pm, both courts, starting Sept. 25th, Sunday till Dec. 18, 2011. $2.00 per player at the door. PBA 2012 Winter League will start Jan. 15 as registration day and official opening Jan. 22, 2012.

	PHOTO HISTORY OF FILIPINOS IN HAMILTON AND SUBURBS The Hamilton Filipino Community Center together with the supporting organizations has come up with this project, Photo History, to be released June 11, 2011 in the celebration of 113th Phil. Independence Gala at Michelangelo Banquet Hall FOR MORE DETAILS EMAIL: OR CALL: Bonner Villabroza  905-545-7622 Gaspar Aberilla    905 381 9412  To learn more about this photo project connect to the informative links below. We hope these will answer all your query. See you at the photo-shoot. PHOTO-HISTORY  2011 INFO  READ FAQ file VIEW SAMPLE PAGE COVER PAGE HFCC PHOTOS   to date

	DID YOU KNOW? Since May of 2010 the HFCC joined the cyber world via the YouTube courtesy of our Social and Special Projects Director Gaspar Aberilla. HFCCITV was spawned by the first Fiesta Filipinas celebration in Hamilton held at the Hill Park Secondary School on May 31st.  That whole day affair was comprised of singing competition, folk dancing from the Philippine Heritage School et al, culminating with the selection of Miss Fiesta Filipina 2010. (click on LOGO to Connect to HFCCITV)   This was also the first sign that this is an election year evidenced by the presence of politicians by the likes of Mayor Fred Eisenberger, Counselor Tom Jackson, MPP Chris Charlton, David Christopherson MP and NDP Leader Ms Andrea Horwath MP. Consul Gen. Minerva Jean Falcon was also in attendance to open the ceremonies.

	Tagalog/Filipino Flyer- Asking Advice from Senior Immigrant Men A research study by Citizenship and Immigration Canada through Ryerson University is looking to interview at least 3 Senior Filipino Men Immigrant (around 65 yrs. old) who arrived within 10 years. Please find the attached flyer in Tagalog for your reference.  The interview will take about 1-2 hours and we will pay you $41 for your participation. Please feel free to contact her if you have questions.   Esel LAxa Panlaqui Homeme 905.212.9368 Cellphone 416.421.1495 Ms. Naty Dayap Tel. 905 574-5692 UPDATE: A Ryerson University researcher is conducting a study through CIC (Canadian Immigration & Citizenship) will be coming to HFCC November 3, 2010, Wednesday, 10:00 am to 1:00 pm to interview 3 male Filipinos who must be 65 years and over in age and must have arrived Canada 10 years ago. In other words, those that arrived here at age 55 and now 65 years old. It does not matter whether this person is employed or not employed. This person will be paid $41.00 by the research group. Snack will be provided by the HFCC Resource Centre Volunteers.   If you know of any one who falls into this category please let us know and instruct the person(s) to be available next Wednesday at HFCC. This will be on a first call basis. We don’t want 5 or 10 people to be there and expect to sit in for the interview, they just need THREE (3). By the way, the interview will be in Tagalog language.   Board members, please distribute or circulate to your members. Bonner Villabroza HFCC President & CEO

Phil. Mission within Canada HFCC BOARD MEMBERS WITH SEAFARERS A group of Filipino seafarers from merchant ship MTAsphalt Carrier based in Belgium on their way up to the great lakes docked at Hamilton harbor and tried to seek religious reinforcement from their long voyage from Europe, across Atlantic ocean, up the St. Lawrence canal, into lake Ontario before proceeding north to great lakes via lakes locks starting from the Welland Canal then up to lake superior.   Most of them are Catholics, they found Deacon Gerry Guinto, a Filipino/Canadian trained deacon based at Asuncion Church to bring them Eucharistic service to their ship. Through Deacon Gerry they expressed the desire to meet some members of the local Filipino community and they were longing for some Filipino food... especially pancit.  The Hamilton Filipino Community Centre (HFCC) is usually open everyWednesday from 10:00 am to 1:00 pm. Upon news of their  arrival, the staff and officers of HFCC Resource and Learning Center prepared and received them with smile and open arms. The seafarers were overwhelmed by the reception, they made this comment. Tears almost welling from their eyes, "Kami po ay mga seaman lamang, wala po kaming mga katungkulan, ngayon po lamang kami nakadama sa tanang buhay namin na kami po pala ay impotante rin, maraming maraming salamat po sa inyong lahat". We are only ordinary seamen, no important ranks in ship but, for the first time in our lives we felt we are somebody, thank you very very much. They left the Centre happy and fully satisfied. They asked and took everything that we let them such as, left over food especially pancit, every Filipino newspaper we had lying around, pens, etc.   For the HFCC staff and officers, it gave us the feeling that: One does not have to go back home to extend help to our kababayans. Names in the picture - #1 Seated L_R: Chris Aberilla, Josie Monaco, Naty Dayap, Cely Villabroza, Sally Viquiera and Nila Tallara Standing L-R: Gaspar Aberilla, seaman Rey Ojano, seaman Nelson Austria, deacon Gerry Guinto, Tony Viquiera, seaman Oscar Pascua, seaman Melvin Palmos, seaman Gabriel Bagnol Jr. and Rey Viquiera. Picture taken by Joe Monaco. Bonner Villabroza HFCC President & CEO MELVIN, NELSON, REY, OSCAR & GABRIEL ENJOYING FILIPINO HOME COOKING

Bayanihan Conference Oct. 9, 2010 at Chelsea/ Delta Hotel in Toronto. After the usual preliminaries of opening a conference with the singing of the Philippine and Canadian National Anthems and the speech of the key note speaker, the first in the agenda was a 4 panel presentation of what and how to form and sustain a Filipino association/organization and a community centre.  Every panel member presented their subject beautifully and effectively. At the end of their presentation, questions and answers period ensued. This writer was the first one to hit the microphone to ask question, but instead of asking question he delivered a comment or some audience thought it was a speech as a rebuttal to the issues brought up by the panel members. Here is the content: Ladies and gentleman of the panel, congratulations and thank you for your enlightening insight to the subject that each of you touched on. The subject of how to form and sustain an organization; the subject on how Filipinos found and populated Canada with the accompanying statistic of the past, present and future projection; the what and how to apply for government funding together with the stringent obligation and responsibilities that comes with it; and, the what and how to sustain a community centre.  Please allow me to share with you our experience in Hamilton when we started our community centre back in 1993 in which it touched every subject that you just illustrated in your power point presentation.  The dream of having a community centre goes back to the year 1975 when the first Constituted Organization in Hamilton, the Pilipino Canadian association (PCA), etched in their constitution and by-law, “to save enough money to start a community centre”. This dream remain dormant for many years due to lack of resources, finance and know how.  In 1989 to 1990, the past president of PCA was appointed to head the community centre committee. A conceptual drawing of a building and projected cost of 2-3 million dollars was presented to the community. At the time, the population of the Filipino community in Hamilton was around 700 families and the 2-3 million dollars seem unrealistic. There were a couple of meetings by the committee and the dream remained a dream. After two years of inaction, the PCA revived the project and appointed another executive member to lead the project. There was a kick off start where people pledged personal and financial supports to start the project. Even after the kick off start the drive suffered a let down.     In 1990 the project leader decided to recruit another person to be his co-leader. The other members of the committee were named and in placed. The first that came up was how are we going to raise the money? The pledges that were remained uncollected were only over $2,000.00. PCA the supposedly owner of the project had only $20,000.00. One member of PCA was a frequent Bingo player. She saw the potential of Bingo fundraising as a major source of raising the necessary fund. We might not reach the million dollars that we were targeting but, this will be a good start to supplement the other fund raising events that we were having at the time such as car wash, calendar sale, bazaar sale, walkathon, beauty pageant and dinner and dances.   On the deliberation of how, what and why the organizational structure be formed, it took many months before we finally found what we thought was the right direction.  We asked and entertained community feedback on how to start and how can we expect their continual support.  Remember, it was a project started by PCA and therefore, they have the right to claim that it is theirs.  However, the other major Fil. Association in Hamilton, the Philippine Islanders’ Association of Hamilton or PICAH has expressed non-support if PCA claims ownership. The other smaller organizations, sports and social clubs expressed the same sentiment.  Based on these strong feedbacks, the committee on the recommendation of the legal counsel decided to form another organization, hence, the birth of Hamilton Filipino community Center in 1990.  The project starter, PCA swallowed their pride and gave full consent for formation of another non-profit organization with its’ own Mission, Vision and Objectives, www.HFCC3.com.  PCA also made a solid commitment that they will donate the $20,000.00 that they saved over the years once the property is bought.  Soon after we formed and registered the organization to Consumer and Commercial Ministry the other organizations and clubs came aboard. This is the case of ‘you build it and they will come’. The moment we accomplished this very important set up or foundation, the fundraising activities intensified. Every supporting organization had their own fundraising events with the proceeds went toward HFCC. In our fund raisings, we learned not to entertain ‘high profile events’ such as hiring a well known entertainer back home to promote the event. It usually cost a lot of money for our small community and at the end either we don’t make any or loss money. We just stuck to bingo sponsorship which brought as quick funds. In 1993 we bought our community centre, a 2 storey building with total square footage of 8,000 sq. ft. We paid cash for it, $106,000.00, spent $150,000.00 in renovation and still… we have over $300,000.00 cash money n the bank. Since we have enough funds to sustain our operation, we stay away from government hand outs.  We received assistance from our City to finish and improve our parking lot and since then we are self sustaining as we operate the organization with business prowess.  Our organizational structure consist of 21 Board Members, 9-4 elected or appointed from the general public and we have 9 supporting organizations and each of them is represented at the Board of Director with equal voting power and say. Ladies and Gentlemen, I have more things to share with you on how to become a successful community centre operator, but my time here is restricted. Maybe, what I should do, with the assistance of a publisher, present our accomplishment in Hamilton as a series in the print media. Thank you for listening……. Bonner Villabroza President & CEO Hamilton, Filipino Community Centre Hfcc@cogeco.net www.hfcc3.com