This talk aims to present a narrative and my own personal reflection of my various involvement and engagement with a number of civic and cultural organizations in Hawai`i including the United Filipino Council of Hawai`i, the umbrella organization of many of the Filipino American organizations. The sharing traces my experience of ‘conscienticization,’ this slow, gradual, but critical process of becoming aware of the systemic discrimination experienced by many of our people even as they try to scratch out a life in Hawai`i, their manner of doing so always with dignity and self-respect. I am a witness to all these—and I have become a witness as well of the transformation of Hawai`i into a more caring, considerate, and compassionate society. The transformation of the society is due to many factors, and one factor is the growing social, cultural, and political presence of Filipinos, Filipino Americans, and ‘the local borns’ who have become aware of the indispensability of the heritage community and the need to build that community by way of alliance building among various Filipino American civic and cultural organizations of which UFCH stands out as its prime example.