In the heart of downtown among the shops, you’ll find Juneau’s Filipino Community Hall.
If you’re just walking by, you could easily miss it – it’s not flashy. There aren’t many windows letting you peer inside, only a humble plaque announcing what it is. But for more than 50 years, it’s been a literal and figurative home to Juneau’s Filipino community.
A lot of Juneau’s Filipinos grew up in this building. But things have changed over the years. The building is getting older, along with many of the people who made this building their home. And now, many of their children and grandchildren have different priorities.
Over the years, the Filipino Community Hall was a place for new arrivals from the Philippines to find a sense of community. They brought their kids there for celebrations and to connect with their heritage.
“We all used to dress up and all were excited for our parties back then,” says Alex “Junior” Carrillo in the episode. “Now it’s hard to get kids to be involved or to want to even come and join parties anymore because it’s just a different – it’s just different. I don’t know how to explain it, but you know, they just didn’t grow up here anymore.”
The building still hosts weekly bingo nights and holiday gatherings, and lately Filipino Community, Inc. has made an effort to hold language and dance classes again. But membership is still down, and getting people to return to the hall will be critical to its survival.
Through elders who remember the hall’s beginnings as a humble pool hall to the new generation of leadership, Adelyn Baxter explores the origins of Juneau’s FilCom Hall and what it means to the community today.
