midnight sun part duex

Filipino American National Historical Society- Anchorage, Alaska

July 4, 2008
So we woke up kinda late, again. it was 4th of july. we asked about fireworks and we were laughed at. Fireworks in the middle of the night? impossible when the suns still out. My mom and sis went gallivanting around Alaska with our Uncle Bening and his lady friend. They went to Portage and Whittier. Rod, Amianan and I went to the conference. We got there in time for the Panel on Ethnic Studies with lolo gonzo, gem daus, oscar p, and Juanita tamayo lott. mad inspiring. its the 40th anniversary since the creation of ethnic studies. i'm grateful for the trailblazers of this movement. i wouldnt be doing what im doing without them. we took a picture with all the folks in the room, left fists up!
oh and i got to meet Gem Daus. a long lost cousin i guess. everyone alwasy asks me if we're brother and sister. i've been asked this since 1999. he has a sister named arlene daus and she was born in long beach. can you believe that?
We broke of lunch and had these sandwhiches longer than Amianan.

after lunch the girls and i headed to allysons room and took a nap. at 3 we headed down for pops/peps workshop on a roundtable of pin@y educators. they played PEPordy and had the teachers talk about their experiences being a pin@y educator. it was great. we had folks compliment the work that we do and told us that folks are watching nationwide.

after we all debriefed and we met about our saturday morning plenary.

we were all hungry. tried to make the 4th of july festival between 9th and 12 street but didnt make it on time. we ate at seafood restaurant close to the hilton and had grilled halibut. yum!

we got back to the house, totally tired from the conference. mom and sis werent back yet. they went to a local baseball game to see my cousin shenlee perform the national anthem. we all had another late 4th of july dinner at my aunts house across the street. 10pm. we had soupas, fried fish, bbq, veggies. met some more aunts and uncles. we have an uncle bong. thats the first in my family. hahahahha!

we went to bed at 2am. my uncles and aunts wanted us to go fishing and clamming with them but we had the conference to go to. they left at 2am with a huge winnebego, atv's and headed 3 hours south for the weekend. we were jealous and kinda irritated that we had 1 more workshop to do. my moms and sis opted out of the trip so they can come with us to the conference and help watch the baby while moms and pops did the plenary. they were tired from their mini adventure around alaska.

we woke up at 6am. yeah thats early in alaska standards. hungry as fuck. we had to buy breakfast at the hotel cafe.
PEP plenary on how to teach filipin@ american studies to youth.
we were kinda of worried that no one would show up. it was an 830 am plenary. the last day of the conference. people trickled in. and of course 840 we had a room of about 100

allyson started off with the welcome and thank you. cause without all those filipino american historians in the room. we would have nothing to teach.

we played this awesome game of move yo' butt. it was totally intergenerational. from young to old. we had a blast. the elders had some funny ones. move yo butt, ubet, or puett if you eat dinung deng and pinakbet.

allyson, me and franciso went over the PEP structure

then we broke up each participant into groups so they can learn our PEPagogies (social justice, counterstorytelling, decolonization etc) and each group had to come up with an art form to teach everyone when we share. the learning and sharing was amazing. it proved to me that PEP actually does work. from 5 years old to 85 years old. fred cordova even shed some tears. it was amazing to show what we do to these folks. i was inspired.

PEP with the Cordovas. Uncle Fred, Auntie Dorothy and Manang Joanie.

After our panel, moms, sis, me, pop, and amianan headed to the weekend farmers market across the street from the hilton. they had over 300 booths of food and goodies. we walked in and i saw a sign for salmon quesadillas. YUM. we walked throught the different lanes, they sold smoked fish, ulu knives, tourist shirts and hats. everything geared to the tourists. i just wanted to eat. had me some quesdillas, chips and water.


i wanted to hit the zoo or the wildberry park before the banquet in the evening. we had about 3 hours to kill. down the street at the visitors center they offered free shuttles to the zoo. we caught one and headed to the Alaska Zoo. i was thinking san diego zoo, la zoo. clean, paved roads. uh no. shit was all gravel, mosquitos the size of birds. totally wild life. no pun intended. i wanted to take amianan there to see animals. we saw really depressed animals. all laying down and aint doin a damn thing. polar bears, moose, grizzlys, birds, leopards, alpacas. we did a speedy version of the tour. we brought the stroller but rod bjorned her the whole time. try pushing a stoller on dirt roads up hill. not cute.
We got back to the house at around 3pm and it gave us some time to relax and get ready for the banquet at 530. we left amianan with my mom and sister. hoping that she wouldn't go crazy again. we were mad early! we met up with the PEP folks and decided to take pics in front of the hotel.

we were still early, that we went to the bar for some well deserved drinks. the banquet was ok. it started late. there was an emcee who yelled at everyone to sit down and started to call names out. not cute. that was uncomfortable. we also brought the yay to AK. jonell brought a bottle of hen and some beer and we drank like it was noonesbidness. yeah we were lout, yeah we got stares from the folks in around us and yeah we looked like the kids table at an all grown up event. so what. we were celebrating our accomplishments, us being in AK, and shit we were on our best behavior all week . it was time to get loose yadidamean?
rod was mad faded by the time we got back to the house.

amianan was crying again. we had phone calls every hour telling us that she wouldnt stop. my sis bjorned her and took her to the park to swing. they tried everything. when we got home she was cool. i fed her and she knocked out. and so did we. it was a long long day. we had one more day to go and that was our chance to have an ultimate alaskan adventure in 10 hours.

AK day of adventure..next post.. gotta go to sleep..baby wakes up in about 7 hours and i need some shut eye.