PinoyBuilt — Stories of Filipino America

Philippines & Los Angeles • August 2026. Born on the Day the Empire Arrived: August 10, 1898, Lorenzo Tañada, and the Long Filipino Argument With America. on this day august 10, lorenzo tanada, mock battle of manila 1898, philippine american war, us military bases philippines, magnificent 12, joseph ileto, fil-am history, decolonization, gumaca quezon, marikina. On This Day • August 10 Philippines & Los Angeles • August 2026 Born on the Day the Empire Arrived: August 10, 1898, Lorenzo Tañada, and the Long Filipino Argument With America American and Spanish officers spent August 10, 1898 arranging a fake battle to hand over Manila while the Filipino army that had already surrounded the city was locked out of it. That same day, in a coastal town in Tayabas, a boy was born who would spend the next ninety-three years arguing with the empire that arrived on his birthday. Manila Bay and the walls of Intramu...

Los Angeles, California • 1991. MAHARLIKA: GENESIS Chapter 1: What Is My Truth?. Filipino American fiction, poker, identity, decolonization, post-Marcos diaspora, Vermont Avenue Los Angeles. FICTION • MAHARLIKA: GENESIS • CHAPTER 1 What Is My Truth? Los Angeles, 1991. He can read every man at the table — the surgeon, the dealer, the kid with the gold chain. The one face he can't read is his own. MAHARLIKA: GENESIS — a Fil-Am who can read every man at a 1991 LA poker table except himself. MAHARLIKA: GENESIS is the novel I've been carrying for years — a mystery about a man who can read everyone except himself, set in the Filipino diaspora of 1991 Los Angeles, in the shadow of a dictatorship we were still learning how to talk about. I'm serializing it here, chapter by chapter, the same way I've tried to write down everything else that matters on this site: for my kids, and for anyone else still asking the same question Miguel is...

Los Angeles, California • June 2026. Antonio Miranda Rodriguez: The Filipino Who Helped Found Los Angeles. antonio miranda rodriguez, los angeles founder, filipino california history, 1781 pueblo, fil-am history, manila galleon, filipinos in america. Filipino American History • June 2026 The Filipino Who Helped Found Los Angeles — And Was Erased From the Plaque Antonio Miranda Rodriguez was recruited as one of the original 12 settler families of El Pueblo de Los Angeles in 1781. A father's loyalty to a dying daughter cost him his place in history. The erased name. The recovered truth. El Presidio de Santa Barbara State Historic Park, where Antonio Miranda Rodriguez — a Manila-born Filipino gunsmith — served as master armorer and was buried in 1784. A memorial tile in the Presidio Chapel was installed by the local Filipino American community in his honor. In the summer of 1781, a Filipino man was making his way north toward a river in...

California • April 2026. UCLA Received 151,107 Applications for Fall 2026 — What Filipino-American Students Need to Know. ucla admissions 2026, filipino american college, ucla fall 2026, california university admissions, fil-am students UC, samahang pilipino, bruins, westwood, los angeles. EDUCATION • CALIFORNIA • APRIL 2026 UCLA Received 151,107 Applications for Fall 2026 — What Filipino-American Students Need to Know For the first time in history, UCLA crossed 150,000 applications. For Filipino-American families in Los Angeles County — home to the largest Fil-Am population in America — the Westwood story did not start with the numbers. It started in 1972. There is a specific moment in every Filipino-American household in Southern California — somewhere in West Covina, Cerritos, Carson, Eagle Rock, or Historic Filipinotown — when the conversation about college turns to UCLA. It is not a casual conversation. It...