From the rubble of the wildfires: The Bayanihan spirit lives on

AAPCUS members on assignment at the Pasadena Evacuation Center with SoCal Pinoy members who delivered hot meals to Filipino caregivers and their patients. L-R: Robert Gamo, Honeymae Gilmore, 2022 Miss Philippines-USA Tourism Hannah Michele Gilmore, Tessa Tanjusay, Remie Valdoria and Tupas (Photo by Nikki Arriola)

As the Santa Ana winds whipped up Southern California and ignited wildfires that burned once thriving communities, Filipinos stepped up in their own small ways and embodied the Bayanihan spirit, attuned to the Angelenos’ strong sense of community, generosity and giving.

Almost every Angeleno, including our fellow Filipinos, are hopeful that Los Angeles County, especially Eaton and Pacific Palisades wildfires which started on January 7, 2025 and contained after 24 days, will rise above the rubble and the ashes of homes and structures  wiped out in enclaves and communities.

The Eaton wildfire, the fifth deadliest and second most destructive wildfire in California history, was in the Eaton canyon and San Gabriel Mountains which covered Pasadena and Altadena cities, burned  14,021 acres, killed 17 persons and injured 8 and 24 missing, destroyed 9,418 structures and 100,000 plus evacuated.

Since Day One, spontaneous initiatives of ordinary citizens sprouted all over Los Angeles and it gave optimism that even families who lost their homes believed they can rebuild these unrecognizable ghost towns left with standing posts, fireplaces and chimneys, burnt cars, burnt trees, cactuses and hedges and solitary signs.

Nikki Arriola inspects the molten metal from the car burned in one of the houses on Altadena Drive. (Photo by Xenia Tupas)

AAPCUS official Paul Mirador, executive director of the Tayo Legacy Foundation spearheaded a team of volunteers stationed at the Santa Anita racetrack parking lot because there was nobody who stepped up to respond to the need for assistance and overflow of support.

As an experienced emergency medical responder from his work with the American Red Cross for 20 years, Mirador helped manage logistics, from donation drop off and pickup at the as people dropped off everyday essentials, water canned goods, hot meals, clothing, shoes, pet food, wheel chairs, crutches and medicines.

Used and brand new donated items were segregated and volunteer stations set up. From January 9-16 when Mirador volunteered, from 630am to 11pm, they provided relief assistance and served hot meals to 3,000 victims on weekdays and 5,000 on weekends. Filipino fast food chain Jollibee also brought hot meals and they were gone in less than an hour.

The tent of Tayo Legacy Foundation manned by its volunteers who distributed relief supplies to victims at the Santa Anita racetrack parking lot. (Photo courtesy of Tayo Legacy Foundation)

On January 10, Mirador helped set up a first aid station to treat burns and minor injuries but the following day, there were volunteer registered nurses assigned with shifts, manned the station and provided services to the victims of the Eaton fire. 

Megan Foronda, coordinator of the National Alliance for Filipino Concerns (NAFCON) in southern California said that when they found out a lot of people were affected and a lot people wanted to help, NAFCON started its donation drive across Los Angeles County, from the San Fernando Valley, Central Los Angeles and to Long Beach.

The five-day donation drive in January, she said, gathered water, food, diapers, clothing, pillows and assembled hygiene kits distributed by 200 volunteers house-to-house to 600 families in the San Fernando Valley to those affected by the Pacific Palisades fire and in Eagle Rock and northeast LA to those affected by the Eaton fire.

AAPCUS official Paul Mirador and Tayo Legacy Foundation stepped up and organized the spontaneous and massive relief effort at the Santa Anita racetrack parking lot. (Photo courtesy of Tayo Legacy Foundation)

“For us Filipinos, we are no strangers to disasters and in any emergency or problem. Whether it is a pandemic our a disaster, we support and protect one another” Foronda said citing NAFCON’s response to the 2020 Covid pandemic, the Lahaina fire and the super typhoons that hit the Philippines in the recent past.

The Pilipino Workers Center also conducted fundraising activities for its relief operations targeting domestic workers who were impacted by the Pacific Palisades and the Eaton wildfire, according to Myrla Baldonado, who handled Phase One of the operations.

She said that they provided cash assistance of either $250 or $750 to these caregivers, whom they consider as heroes giving special mention to two Filipino live-in caregivers because they helped their male patient evacuate even as his family wanted him left behind as the wildfire raged.

Now on its second phase of its assistance program, PWC raised cash and received donations of 200 boxes of canned good to be distributed to affected families and individuals, Baldonado said.  

As of March 9, PWC has assisted some 455 victims which is as follows: cash assistance to 129 Filipinos of whom 104 are domestic workers from the Pacific Palisades and Eaton wildfires area; facilitated application of 100 Filipinos for Assistance to Nationals with the Philippine Consulate in Los Angeles; assisted and organized the application of 76 workers for the wildfire cash assistance of the Los Angeles County Department of Economic Opportunities; and distributed to 150 individuals and families bags of groceries in the Eaton wildfire affected area.

SoCal Filipinos, a network of Filipinos linking communities in southern California, distributed Jollibee meals and other necessities  to the Filipino caregivers on January 13. The SoCal Filipinos delegation led by Tessa Tanjusay comprised of Remy Valdoria, Honeymae Gilmore and her daughter Hannah Michele, 2022 Miss Philippines-USA Tourism.

Fil-am actor and singer Anthony Honore aka Honore also lost his family home in Altadena yet, was at the Pasadena Convention Center and helped distribute vegan meals to those in need through The Plant Based Treaty. (Photo by Xenia Tupas)

Filipino American actor-singer Anthony Honore was also with Plant Based Treaty, a group that advocates plant-based diet to combat climate change, distributing vegan pasta lunchboxes to victims of the Eaton wildfire at the convention center.

Honore, whose lost his childhood and family home in Altadena, said “we are all alive, thank goodness  and we are giving back. I am also here as a vegan because plant based treaty is giving out plant based food to all the people here needing help.”

He has his own home in San Gabriel where his cousins and the rest of his family has evacuated. “Everybody survived  and everybody is in my house,” he added with a positive note that “am safe and sound, my auntie is okay, the neighbors are okay, they are all at my other house, they are taken cared of.”