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---Pearl S. Buck International(PSBI) received help from Apl.de.ap
Written By: Naila Francis
Edited By: Adriana Perez
Allan Pineda was sponsored through its Opportunity House Program as a child and eventually adopted and brought to the states in 1988 by his sponsor, Joe Ben Hudgens, then a single Los Angeles-based attorney who believed it to be no coincidence that he entered the young Filipino’s life when he did.
“Once I realized that one of the men in the Black Eyed Peas was in our sponsorship program, I became a big Black Eyed Peas fan,” says Janet L. Mintzer, president and CEO of Pearl S. Buck International.
Hudgens, however, while proud of his adoptive son’s success, can’t say the same. “Let me put it this way,” he says, speaking by phone from his home in Alhambra, Calif. “My favorite composer is Johannes Brahms. In terms of hip-hop and rap and so forth, that’s rather an acquired taste for me and I’m still trying to acquire it.”
The Texas native never imagined he’d be the adoptive father to anyone, let alone a celebrity, a factor that still seems to catch him off guard every now and then — such as the moment Allan told Oprah Winfrey when the Peas were a guest on her show that he wouldn’t be where he is today without Hudgens. “It came almost as a physical shock to me. I don’t know what happened after that on the Oprah show because my telephone started ringing and rang the rest of the day,” he says.
Hudgens, who never married, was traveling through the Far East in the late-1970s, when he was struck by the many children he saw living in poverty. Unable to forget those images when he returned home, he stumbled upon Pearl S. Buck International while searching for relief programs to help them. At the time, he had never been to the Philippines.
“I indicated that I was willing to sponsor a child. The foundation gave me the choice of nationality and sex, and I refused to designate either one. They decided on a Filipino,” he says. “Allan was then about 5 years old, maybe a little younger than that. … Apparently, he was the product of an affair between a black U.S. airman who was shot down over Vietnam and a Filipino woman.”
According to Mintzer, through the Opportunity House Program, sponsors contribute $25 a month, or $300 a year, to a child’s health care and education. “The focus is a little bit different in each country where we work,” she says, “but in all cases, the donor gets matched one-on-one to the child and they write letters and help support the child.”
About three years into his sponsorship, Hudgens learned that Allan urgently wanted to see him. So he collected on his overtime and set off for the Philippines and Angeles City in the province of Pampanga, where Allan lived with his mom and six siblings. It was there he discovered why he’d been matched with the future star.
“We stopped first at his school and his teacher said he was a nice kid except he would fight with anybody else in the class for the desk nearest the chalk board in the classroom,” recalls Hudgens. “We went from there to visit him at his home, and he went to get his English reader to show me how well he could read English. He read it in the good old Walter Cronkite American English, but he had to press the pages of his book against his glasses that we’d bought him.”
Hudgens, who’d been plagued with eye problems most of his life, insisted that Allan see an ophthalmologist, who diagnosed him with congenital nystagmus, an involuntary movement of the eyes often accompanied by vision loss at birth. (Earlier this year, Apl.de.ap told People magazine that he was legally blind.) Hudgens secured a medical visa to bring Allan to the U.S. for a second opinion, where the diagnosis was confirmed. Although the condition is permanent, he was determined to do whatever he could to help.
“The hardest thing I had to do was put Allan back on the plane to the Philippines when his medical visa was expiring,” he says. “It seemed to me that it was quite fortuitous that I was sponsoring a child who, like me, had eye problems. … I thought, ‘Hey, Providence is telling me I ought to get with this and see what I can do.’ -“I finally concluded that the best thing would be to adopt him if they would allow a single-parent adoption.”
Mintzer acknowledges that Hudgens’ request, and his eventual approval, was definitely unusual, as most sponsorship relationships do not lead to adoption. “It doesn’t happen nowadays because international adoption has changed dramatically and there are so many restrictions on it, but in those days, in the ’80s, it happened,” she says. “The reason it happened with Apl was because he had an eye disease … and his mom agreed so he would have the opportunities he wouldn’t have in the Philippines.”
While it would take years before Allan arrived in the U.S. to live, his career wouldn’t come as a complete surprise to his adoptive father. “Before he came, he sent a letter indicating that he had discovered watching American television that there was this thing called rap. And I didn’t know what that was, but he said he looked forward to participating in that when he came to the USA,” says Hudgens. An acquaintance who had been a dancer on Casey Kasem’s 1960s dance show “Shebang” suggested that Hudgens introduce him to his nephew, William Adams (will.i.am), upon his arrival, since the youngster was also into rap.
Allan arrived in Los Angeles on his 14th birthday and did ultimately meet and become fast friends with Adams. The two began performing at parties and events across Southern California, first as part of the break-dancing crew Tribal Nation and then as Atban Klann before they would eventually emerge as the incarnation of the Grammy-winning, multimillion-selling Black Eyed Peas who took the halftime Superbowls stage.
While Hudgens had little influence on his son’s career path, he does like to think his sponsorship of him, as well as other kids he’s been subsequently matched with through PSBI, has set an example. It was Apl who contacted the organization wanting to help with its efforts in the Philippines, says Mintzer.
In December, he visited PSBI’s affiliate office in Quezon City to deliver Christmas presents and contribute to a scholarship fund for children in its sponsorship program. He also has started his own Apl Foundation to give back to communities within the Philippines and throughout Asia, and plans to work with artists from developing countries on his record label Jeepney Music.
“He’s a really good guy,” says Mintzer, who met the rapper, along with Fergie, when the Peas performed at the Wells Fargo Center (formerly the Wachovia Center) last year. “He really wants to help because he knows that he had such a great advantage through the Pearl Buck program. That really gave him the opportunity of his life and he really wants to see other kids have that.” | | | |
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