IF you google the name Therese Rodriguez, you will see 50-plus “Therese Rodriguez” profiles from different parts of the world—mostly various women professionals on Linked in.
But if you google Therese R. Rodriguez Apicha, then you will discover that Therese is the CEO of Apicha Community Health Center in New York, a nationally recognized model of HIV services for Asians and Pacific Islanders. Since its infancy in 1989, Apicha Community Health Center was historically known as the Asia & Pacific Islander Coalition on HIV/AIDS and operated with the acronym APICHA. Therese spearheaded efforts for Apicha to become a federally qualified health center in 2015 so that the nonprofit center could broaden its scope of services. She was listed as one of Crain’s 2019 Notable Women in Health Care and among Crain’s Notable 2022 Asian Leaders.
Today Apicha provides primary care, preventive health and mental services to vulnerable populations, especially Asians and Pacific Islanders, the LGBT community and those with HIV/AIDS.
It also states the most important fact: that Therese was raised in the Philippines.
Born and raised in Parañaque
Proudly, Therese was born and raised in the Philippines, particularly in Paranaque where she and I were classmates in kindergarten, were members of the Church based Junior Daughters of Isabella, and together with a smaller group of high school friends, we formed a small teenage “barkada” we called “The Juniorettes.” She was what was then called a convent-bred “colegiala” having been educated in St. Paul’s Paranaque, St. Scholastica’s for high school, and in 1971, she graduated with Business Administration and Liberal Arts degrees from St. Theresa’s College in Quezon City.
As she was growing up, she was exposed to the civic and political work of progressives in Paranaque and eventually became an active member of the Samahang Kabataan ng Paranaque (SKP) and was involved in a series of nationalist protest movements.
In 1972, Therese was sent by her parents to New York where she has lived and worked continuously until today. We kept in touch all these years; I would see her when I was in NY and we would always meet up whenever she visited here. And those were the times she would tell me how her political activism grew and evolved to make a strong impact in her community.
I first honored her as one of the 100 outstanding Filipinas we featured in “100 Women of the Philippines: Celebrating Filipina Womanhood in the New Millennium,” the very first coffeetable book I published in the year 1999. There I wrote: “In New York…for a decade and a half, Therese committed time and energy…to the anti-dictatorship struggle and to the civil rights causes in the Filipino community.” That was Therese: always committed, always concerned for others.
During one of her prepandemic visits, she casually handed me a loose compilation of her poetry and writings, started since 2011. Just for me to read she said, and hopefully, to give her my personal comments. Honestly, I never got to read it until the pandemic, when I finally went over each piece and realized that she had actually narrated her life and summarized the complexities of her experiences shaped by her homeland and her new home. In poetry!
Not a poet but a storyteller
THERESE never claimed to be a poet and in fact shares that she barely passed English grammar.
In her words:
“My college poetry teacher Miss Miraflor must be turning in her grave because I did not appreciate poetry then. I am more of a storyteller. I listen and hear the fears, the pains, and the joy of others. I’ve learned to convey the needs of people who cannot speak for themselves, express their hopes and possibilities and articulate their vision for a better world. These are the values that my family, town elders and members of the progressive movement had nurtured in me. All this I’ve translated into poetry in my book.”
It was her candor and humor, plus her innate profoundness, sensitivity and compassion for the community that became very apparent in her writing and I found it very refreshing. I felt compelled to convince her to allow me to publish it for her. She is, after all, a very private person but I told her it would be a great legacy gift not only for her family but for our town (now city) of Parañaque.
Reluctant at first, she eventually agreed but being the OC (obsessive compulsive) personality that she is, she also wanted it to be perfect.
That’s why it took us almost three years to complete the planning, layout, choice of cover and fonts and the printing of the book, communicating mostly via zoom meets, Viber chats and regular phone calls between Manila and New York.
Sheila Coronel wrote the Foreword
WHEN we were discussing who would be the best person to write the Foreword, she picked Sheila Coronel as a person she truly admired and respected, admitting that she would be very honored to have Sheila even if they had never met. She is now very grateful to the multiawarded journalist, editor and author who was a founding member of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism and was the Academic Dean of Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism in New York where she currently teaches investigative journalism.
It was providential that my dear family friend Rochit Tanedo connected me with Sheila who, after reading the book, graciously submitted the Foreword that Therese had only dreamed and hoped for.
Sheila wrote:
“Therese is refreshingly honest about the befuddlement of a foreigner transported to America…Therese soon peeled the many layers of her adopted country and grappled with the questions of identity across America’s ethnic, religious and gender divides. Her perspective is shaped by being a lifelong health and community worker, a lesbian, and woman of color in New York City, “a metropolis built on the back of immigrants.”
The Manila Book launch
THERESE came home this month to launch her book in a simple, intimate reunion with close family, classmates and selected friends in attendance. Two more book launches are being planned for her: one in LA and the other in San Francisco.
She still cannot believe the warm reception that friends and colleagues have given her book. She always asks them: Did you read it? And not a few of them tell her they couldn’t stop reading it.
Here are some comments from those who came to the launch:
Pol F. Moral
Retired advertising executive and a Parañaque senior resident:
“The book Paranaque to New York City, Fifty Poems is hard to put down, literally and figuratively. Done reading, savoring, learning from, reminiscing, holding back a tear. I love all 50. ‘Meandering’ moved me the most.”
Jocelyn F. Domingo
Former Advertising/Publishing Executive and Paranaque resident:
“Therese’s book of poetry could well be her autobiography. Written with such unflinching candor, the storied narrative in her 50 poems defined her—fearless, unapologetic, and relatable. It is an exemplary record of our times! Truly inspiring. “
Virgilio A. Reyes Jr.
Philippine ambassador to South Africa and Italy
Career diplomat, author, journalist, cultural heritage advocate
“The multifaceted Therese R. Rodriguez—pioneer Filipino immigrant, nationalist, community organizer, human rights activist, unabashed LGBTQ advocate, APICHA head and iconic leader on Asia Pacific issues—surprises us once more with a breathtaking poetic summary of her life from childhood to a groundbreaking career in the New York metropolitan area…”
There are limited copies of the book so I advise you to try and get a first edition copy while it has not been launched in the US And while there are still a few remaining here in Manila.
Don’t take my word for it because I am the publisher but I seriously believe Therese is an exceptional storyteller using poetry as her medium. Watch out for her next book which she is already thinking of doing.
PR Matters is a roundtable column by members of the local chapter of the United Kingdom-based International Public Relations Association (Ipra), the world’s premiere association for senior communications professionals around the world. Joy Lumawig-Buensalido is the President and CEO of Buensalido PR and Communications. She was past Chairman of the IPRA Philippine chapter for two terms.
PR Matters is devoting a special column each month to answer our readers’ questions about public relations. Please send your questions or comments to askipraphil@gmail.com.