Congratulations to Fil Am Arts and FPAC Committee and of course volunteers for 25 years of offering…read morethe Festival of Philippine Arts and Culture to the Southern California Community. For 2016, FPAC was held for the first time at Echo Park Lake, a newly renovated city park and a beautiful venue for the festival.
I haven't been to FPAC for a couple of years, and I was a little disappointed at first when I checked online and found out that the festival is down to a single day. When the festival was held in San Pedro, it was a 2-day event filled with two performance stages, food booths, Filipino craft vendors, demonstrations, etc. Even though it's down to a single day, however, FPAC 2016 had the same degree of excitement and pride as in previous years, attended not just by Filipinos and Filipino Americans, but a diverse group of Angelenos representing all races and backgrounds.
Throughout the day, the performance stage offered performances by Filipino and Filipino American artists. The emcee was the amazing and talented Giselle Tongi, the host of Channel 18's Kababayan Today. We got the chance to catch the dance troupe Kayamanan ng Lahi (translated "Treasure of our Race") as well as Broadway star Jon Jon Briones (Miss Saigon). Kayamanan ng Lahi is truly an L.A. treasure, offering dance workshops to all ages as young as 5 years old. The youngest dancers of the troupe definitely stole the show. Jon Jon Briones, who starred recently at East West Player's production of La Cage aux Folles and will once again star as the engineer in Miss Saigon on Broadway, is another Filipino treasure who graced the stage at FPAC 2016.
Plenty of Filipino food was offered at various food booths at FPAC 2016. Vendors included Neri's Turo Turo, Kapamilya Restaurant, The Park's Finest, Magnolia Ice Cream, Manila Sky, Enseymada Project. Due to the long lines at Neri's, we chose Kapamilya Restaurant, located in Fountain Valley (4 Stars for the Chicken and Pork BBQ sticks). We also finally got to try Enseymada Project (4 Stars for the yummy desserts). There were also various Filipino vendors at FPAC 2016, offering a variety of crafts as well as clothing. Previous reviews stated that there was a lack of vendors when the event was held at Grand Park in 2014 and 2015, and this was definitely not the case in 2016.
Why not 5 stars? FPAC 2016 happened to fall on a very hot day in L.A., and Echo Park Lake does not have enough shade. It would have been nice if organizers made more tents and canopies available for attendees. Also, there were not enough seats set up for the audience at the performance stage. Moreover, there was no consistency between the food vendors whether they accepted cash or FPAC bucks/food tickets. We were originally going to get The Park's Finest, but they only accepted FPAC bucks, but there was no clear signage where to get FPAC bucks/food tickets. Finally, I wish that there was more publicity for the event. FPAC 2016 was pretty well attended, but there's room for FPAC to grow. The FilAm Arts website, for example, was not updated with the FPAC schedule and vendors until the week of the festival. I would love to see FPAC grow and get even bigger and better in the future. Don't miss it in 2017!