PinoyBuilt — Stories of Filipino America

Chicago, IL • October 2026. Remembering Pinsan Jun: Chicago, December 1987, After Medusa’s. jun rivera, leonardo rivera jr, allan rivera, jason palma, medusa’s chicago, medusa’s on sheffield, chicago 1987, albany park chicago, gordon tech, barr tower lakeview, filipino american chicago, chicago nightlife, clubbing, barkada, kabataan, in memoriam, 10/25. Chicago • December 1987 Remembering Pinsan Jun: Chicago, December 1987, After Medusa’s Jun Rivera would have turned 58 today. A street corner in Albany Park, his Mustang, and the three of us fresh out of Medusa’s on a night I still can’t pin to a date. Chicago, late December 1987 (or possibly January 1988): J.F., Jun and Allan Rivera on a corner in Albany Park after Medusa’s, with Jun’s Mustang in the bottom right corner. Photo by Liza. Jun Rivera would have turned 58 today. I already posted one photo of him earlier today, the Blue Rock Springs birthday party in Vallejo in 2004 . This is the o...

Vallejo, CA • October 2015. Six Flags Discovery Kingdom: 2016 Season Passes, Day One. six flags discovery kingdom, 2016 season passes, vallejo, jian, nica, chesca, filipino-american family, throwback, on this day, 10/4. ON THIS DAY • VALLEJO • OCTOBER 2015 Six Flags Discovery Kingdom: 2016 Season Passes, Day One Jian, Nica and Chesca on a Sunday in Vallejo, four days before Ate Nica turned 15. An ordinary family day, kept on purpose. Left to right: Jian, Nica and Chesca at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom, October 4, 2015. Facebook Memories handed this one back to me today: October 4, 2015, a Sunday, at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom in Vallejo. Left to right, that's Jian, Nica and Chesca. My caption back then was short: "First time to use their 2016 season passes." I can't find the original post anymore, so I'm moving the memory here, to the archive I keep. It was four days before Ate Nica's 15th b...

Fairfield, California • August 2002. Four Days Before Tess's Birthday, I Found This. nica perseveranda childhood video, tess garcia perseveranda, chuck e cheese fairfield california, filipino american family archive, on this day pinoybuilt, august 12 2002. ON THIS DAY • AUGUST 12 FAIRFIELD, CA • AUGUST 2002 Four Days Before Tess's Birthday, I Found This Twenty-four years ago today, my late wife Tess held onto our not-quite-two-year-old at a Chuck E. Cheese in Fairfield. In four days, it would have been her thirtieth birthday. Placeholder hero — swap for the real photos once they're pulled from the archive. Twenty-four years ago at 12:30 PM, I had a digital camera in my hand and documenting my family and building my archive as always. My daughter Veronica — Nica — is sitting on a yellow-and-black coin-operated motorcycle at a Chuck E. Cheese in Fairfield, California, gripping the handlebars like...

Vallejo, CA • August 2026. Congratulations Dominic & Paige! Big News Coming This September. dominic perseveranda, paige, vallejo filipino american, wardlaw elementary, blue rock springs park, fil-am family, garry perseveranda. FAMILY • VALLEJO • AUGUST 2026 Congratulations Dominic & Paige! Big news is coming this September for two people who once stood shoulder to shoulder in front of a Tinker Bell piñata at a Vallejo birthday party. For now — save the date, and get ready to celebrate. Blue Rock Springs Park, Vallejo — Saturday, July 16, 2005. Dominic and Paige, 5yo or almost five, front and center at Chesca's first birthday party. Some articles start with research. This one started with a shoebox — or the digital equivalent of one, a folder of old party photos I hadn't opened in years. I went looking for a specific shot from Chesca's first birthday, and what I found instead was this: a Tinke...

Pasadena, CA • April 2018. Arrival in Pasadena: Tita Gigi's Driveway Before the Wedding. Tita Gigi, Diana Perseveranda, Tess, Nica, Jian, Chesca, Vallejo to Pasadena road trip, Cabungcal wedding Los Angeles, blue Honda Odyssey, Samsung Galaxy S5 selfie, Filipino American family photo, kapamilya, 4/26. KAPAMILYA • PASADENA • APRIL 2018 Arrival in Pasadena: Tita Gigi's Driveway Before the Wedding We had just driven down from Vallejo. Tita Gigi's driveway in Pasadena was the first stop, and one selfie on a Samsung Galaxy S5 marks the arrival. Arrival in Pasadena, 4/26/18: Tita Gigi (Diana Perseveranda), Tess, Nica, Jian, Chesca and me in Tita Gigi's driveway after the drive from Vallejo, the blue Honda Odyssey at right. Eight years ago today, 4/26/18, we pulled into Tita Gigi 's driveway in Pasadena after driving down from Vallejo . This is the photo we took to mark it: a selfie on m...

Pasadena, CA • January 2004. Kapamilya in Pasadena Before the Long Drive Home. family archive, fil-am, filipino, pasadena, california, vallejo, kapamilya, perseveranda, cervantes, tess, road trip, throwback, pinoybuilt. Family Archive • January 2004 Kapamilya in Pasadena Before the Long Drive Home One last family photo at the titas' house in Pasadena before the Perseverandas pile into the van for the long drive back to Vallejo. Pasadena, CA — January 4, 2004. At the titas' house before the drive back to Vallejo. Pasadena, California. January 4, 2004. Tess, Nica, Jian, and I had spent the Christmas holidays in Arizona. We dropped off my mother-in-law and Tess's niece Reah at Tess's ate's house in Glendale, AZ — they'd be flying back to the Philippines from there. Then we drove to the titas' house here in Pasadena for a few nights. My cousin Kristine Cervantes, her daughter, and her sister Rosanne had been o...