BICOL CLUB OF HAWAIIPARENTS OF THE YEAR 2007

       It is but fitting to recognize Mr. Felipe and Mrs. Paz Celebrado as Parents of the Year of the Bicol Club of Hawaii for 2007.  One of the founding members of the club in 1978, Fel and Paz have been very supportive of the club's endeavors weathering through political and emotional upheavals that beset its trying years.  Just imagine how many dishes have they fed the club with just by attending its potluck meetings.  A full attendance of 12 meetings per year for almost 30 years could have been more than 300 sumptuous and delectable dishes from their kitchen.  But what is remarkable is the caring and support this pair has given the association from their good-natured intentions and their stars for it was meant to be that they nurture not only their own. 

      Travel through time some 50 years back.  Picture a dashing debonair coming home from the US navy to marry a lady whom he met at a town dance five years earlier.  At that time, he has traveled the world for a good two terms of enlisted commitment to Uncle Sam’s conventional and nuclear submarines and she just finished her nursing degree and was ready to show the world her caring expertise. 

          The Celebrado world saga started in September of 1958 in Hawaii then California, Virginia, Florida and Connecticut – a living portrait of a typical sailor’s nomad life and the most sought after profession of a Florence Nightingale.   

              After their Connecticut sojourn where Melissa was born, they moved back to Hawaii where their second child Philip joined them.  From then on they claimed the islands as their home and cradled their fellow Bicolanos as their extended partedario.  No sooner, the Bicol Club of Hawaii was born in 1978.   

            Now, Melissa who completed her undergraduate degree in Social Work at the University of Hawaii and her MBA in Health Care Management at the University of Phoenix, manages a case management department at HMSA.  She and husband Dominic have three children -  Elyse, Juliana and Quinn.  Likewise, Philip who at one time had his name flushed on the major productions of Hawaii television, is currently with the Department of Communication of the University of Washington and Fox News Affiliate in Seattle.  He was recently recognized as employee of the year at the University of Washington.  He and wife Jane have two children, Nicolas and Zachary.   

            Through the years, Fel and Paz have been surrounded by people who enjoy their blessings of a lifetime – the Celebrado sense of security, so serene, so poised. #jp orias