HOW THE HERITAGE WILL BE PRESERVED Once the construction of the Filipino Cultural Center is completed, a wide range of community activities will take place. Exhibits for cultural arts and artifacts rehearsal studio for the Sinag-Tala Dance Troupe Filipiniana multi-media library meeting rooms for the Filipino Association meeting rooms for executive ,board, and committee groups educational classrooms for language studies, cooking, folk dancing and other cultural activities

Would you like to be a part of something monumental? How about a place where the Filipino community can assemble to preserve and promote the Filipino heritage in the Greater Kansas City area? How about calling this place the Filipino Cultural Center? Sounds ambitious? But weren’t you this ambitious when you set your sights to go to America years ago? Back then you were not alone in your flight... think of the parents who sent you to school, the mother who washed clothes for a living... think of the money that was scratched from nowhere and sent you packing to America... think of those who helped you get around the Kansas City area - the one you called Ate or Kuya, the ones who opened their homes to you especially on a frosty Christmas Eve when you’re feeling alone and terribly, pitifully homesick... think of how much you have accomplished against all odds, against failures... think of your family, your children and the grandchildren to come - proud of inheriting a unique culture - yours!

Aren’t these thought inspirational enough to put them in concrete form and not just a dream or a memory? The Filipino Cultural Center ... the symbol of who we are: as a group, as individuals, where we are heading into... let everyone see!

• Support the Filipino Cultural Center Foundation.

• Make it a cultural commitment for all generations to ensure that the Filipino culture will continue to flourish in spite of acculturation.

• Make it a social commitment to support the Filipino community effort - in the spirit of "bayanihan" and "kababayan." If it, "takes a village to raise a child," then it will take all of us to build the center in varying degrees of participation and contribution, but whatever it is, the sum will be greater... it will be monumental!

by Tess Laoruangroch RN