The Kultura Movement

The founder of this organization is Chris Cardenas, who was helped by his fraternity brother Marl Anjo Santiago, also known as Jo Briones and his girlfriend Coleen in figuring out a design and name that shows the love of basketball from the Filipino people. With the help of Coleen's friend, Shannen Faye, we gave her all the details of our imagination and ideas. She was the one who created our idea and made the Filipino Kid logo wearing slippers and a hat with a broken basketball board background. The Kultura Fil-Am Basketball Association of Chicago was officially established in 2024, where we had visitors from New York, Ohio, Indiana, and St. Louis participate in our 2-day basketball tournament last year. The goal of this organization is to have camaraderie and fellowship in our community while playing competitive and sporting basketball at the same time, and to be active and healthy all at the same time. It helps with mental health, emotional health, and physical health for all participants and even our guests, giving them entertainment and something to look forward to. Our Filipino American community in Chicago and all around the United States has been very supportive of this kind of event. Because of basketball, I made a lot of friends and stayed connected to our community. I decided to start a meaningful Kultura merch to remind us of our culture and roots, and for the love of basketball. They say Filipinos are the best speakers if basketball was a language. Kultura has also been very generous and supportive of our local events here in Chicago and even in New York, sponsoring league fees, basketball jerseys, and giving away Kultura shirts for some participants who supported Kultura's basketball 2-day tourney event. Kultura is very thankful and grateful for all kinds of support that we had.

One of our goals is to give chances to all the basketball players who have talents but were never given a chance to show their skills and talents, and never had a chance to play in professional basketball. Maybe someday Kultura will be able to expose them to some professional scouts who may be able to see their hidden talents. As Kultura, we believe that a lot of Filipino Americans have a chance to play in professional basketball, and one of our goals is to make a good exposure of these talents and maybe help them achieve their dreams and improve their skills and experience all at the same time. Basketball is at the heart of Filipino culture.