Dons Revival
In late 1996, a core group of Dons living in the San
Francisco Bay Area, Californiawith a strong desire to carry on the
spiritinitiated the Dons revival with a series of fellowships and the
staging of dinner-dance events in 1997 and 1998. The event themes
revisited the Dons heyday by recalling the sights and sounds of the
past. Similar events followed in 1999 in Los Angeles, in 2000 in San
Diego, in 2001 in San Francisco. All these events and fellowships have
demonstrated the resiliency of the Dons organization. The key leaders
of the revival were Benjie Kalugdan, Boyer Kalugdan, Tony Abarro, Juju
Villareal, and Bob Icayan.
In February of 2002, the first-ever
grand reunion of the Dons was held in Cavite City. The reunion
activities included a courtesy call on Mayor Totie Paredes (a Past Most
Grand Don), and a grand forty-vehicle motorcade around the city. The
reunion culminated in a dinner-dance at the Josephines Restaurant in
Kawit, Cavite, which was attended by several long-missed friends. The
reunion was able to net about 80 thousand pesos as proceeds and members
ruled that this money be kept in reserve for the planned project: the
new Clock Tower. Kudos for the job well done went to Chimboy Poblete,
Nonet Alvarez, Pepe Cheng Sy, Bhoogie Guerrero, Ric Nuguid, and for the
USA coordinators, Benjie Kalugdan.