By snoadmin
On Friday evening in the Carpenter Performing Arts Center, the Pilipino-American Coalition (PAC) hosted the 21st annual Pilipino Culture Night (PCN), a theater production filled with live music, ancient and modern dance styles, and a theme with comical elements that highlighted hardships of Filipino-Americans from the past and present. The cast included up to 200 Filipino-American or culture-driven students, along with a Filipino band, Cal State Long Beach Asian American Studies faculty and the PAC modern dance team.
This year, the show was called “Reflections of Our Struggle,” with equality and justice being the main messages. It clustered two similar storylines from different time periods that later collided into one event. The stage was split in half for both sets of characters to reveal their individual problems.
“We had a burning idea in our heads about the [migrants],” said Jason Samson, play co-writer and Asian American Studies major.” “We wanted to reflect the storylines and had them come together, because we’re faced with similar struggles but on a higher level thanks to the foundation [our ancestors] set for us.”
One side told a story of Filipino migrant workers in search of the American Dream in the 1920s, only to find themselves working in the fields for a dollar and facing racial riots caused by locals who accused them of stealing jobs and women. The other side of the stage was about the typical generational issues today’s Asian-American youth face, and learning to step up the corporate ladder by taking a stand against a perceived unethical system.
Along with the acting came dances in between scenes. PAC modern, the school’s award-winning hip-hop dance team, showed its support with a performance. Other forms ranged from mountainous tribal dances from times of war to Spanish- and Muslim-influenced dances performed during social events or royal gatherings.
The final dance performance was the Tinikling, a form connected with the Filipino culture. The dance involves long and heavy bamboo sticks being simultaneously clapped together as the dancers move across them, all the while avoiding the snap of the sticks.
The production closed with the intermingling of both stories and the modern generation learning from the farm workers and gaining an appreciation of their culture. Each side honored Philip Vera Cruz, a Filipino laborer who worked with Cesar Chavez to create the United Farm Worker’s strike in Central California to gain fair working conditions.
“It was 3 months of hard work, but what I loved the most were the friendships and memories that I’m walking away with,” said Sonny Aguirre, senior cast member and vice president of PAC. “I learned about the power of people and how much one person can make a difference in the community. It just takes one person to create a big change.”
