LOS ANGELES — Filipinotown’s unsettling congruency with its contradictions can be unnerving – yet it remains indisputably poignant. Its Filipino-ness cuts through the flesh, deep down – like a shot of lambanog that eerily warms within, calms one down, but there’s no escaping from its volatile hook. When the spirit kicks in, you know it’s there – there’s no denying it.

So I asked myself, for the nth time, “This is Filipinotown; where are the Filipinos?”

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