2019 Taste of Manila: An Ocean of Humanity

Volume 1, Issue No. 5

OPINION/COMMENTARY

/ News That Fears None, Views That Favor Nobody /

. . . . . A community service of The Filipino Web Channel (TheFilipinoWebChannel@gmail. com) and the Philippine Village Voice (PhilVoiceNews@gmail.com) for the information and understanding of Filipinos and the diverse communities in North America . . . . . .

Our latest as of Thursday, August 22, 2019 

~  The yelling, singing, dancing, and stomping multitudes are indicators of how immensely successful the 2019 edition of Taste of Manila was. The street festival beggars description. The sea of humanity that descended in Toronto's Little Manila became an ocean of revelers in no time. That's how it was during the weekend of August 17-18 when the 2019 fest, North America's largest Filipino event, took place.

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LITTLE MANILA'S OCEAN OF HUMANITY

2019 Taste of Manila Beggars Description

By ROMEO P. MARQUEZ 

Editor, The Filipino Web Channel

“We reveal to ourselves and others what is important to us by the way we celebrate.” ― Noël Piper

TORONTO - The best available words would suffice to describe this year's Taste of Manila festival - epic, gigantic, monumental, monstrous, elephantine.

Who needs numbers when those adjectives apply to the massive turnout of people on the first and second days of the street fest on its traditional grounds in the Bathurst-Wilson area in North York?

The appointed time on Saturday, August 17, 2019, was 9 a.m. when the program was scheduled to start. I made sure that I will be there, and certainly, I was, five minutes prior. But then nature intervened, pouring out tears of happiness I suppose, in the form of thunderstorms.

The intermittent rains doused the area, giving the length and breadth of Little Manila a fresh, moistening splash to counterbalance the summer heat. I was worried a bit that the streak of rainwater would not stop and cancel out the festival. I was wrong. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nICEcg3G0us).

The rains are always a good omen, says Deputy Consul General Bernadette Fernandez who took shelter at the office of iRemit with her team from the Philippine Consulate. Even as it's still early, the storefront was full. People were filling up forms to remit money to their loved ones while others simply stayed put to avoid getting wet.

Thirty or forty minutes past the hour, the sky cleared as if giving a naughty smile to the revelers down below waiting, hoping and praying that nature's drenching would cease. The rains did end at that very moment. Then Bathurst Street where the main stage at Wilson Avenue stood, began to fill.

The unease that I felt earlier had vanished. Individuals, then groups of people, then humankind were coming out of establishments that lined the fenced road and walked around waiting for a sign of when the celebration would commence. 

Meanwhile, the hundreds of booths - restos, karinderias Philippine style, hole-in-the-wall stores, and satellite offices - along Bathurst St. prepared to receive their first customers for the day. The usual parade of participants scheduled earlier had been canceled because of the rains, so the main programming would begin soon.

By mid-day and towards the afternoon, the asphalt-paved Bathurst St. was indistinguishable. Waves upon waves were descending from everywhere. The north-south road artery was now a sea of humanity. One could hardly walk without bumping into another person. That's how tight it was. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AanA5a2V6y4).

I've seen how Taste of Manila morphed from a community-inspired reach out in 2014 with just about 60,000 attendees which, incidentally, defied projections that had placed an estimate of no bigger than 5,000, to a colossal 350,000 people in 2018 when Taste of Manila almost did not happen due to budgetary constraints.

With a five-year incremental record starting in August 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018, exceeding reasonable expectations, this year's Taste of Manila beggars description. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1cIFfkpnQI).

A prudent analysis based on what I've witnessed during my yearly news coverage, I would say the immense crowd would be well beyond the 350,000 official estimates of last year. A conservative number would be 400,000.

The indicators of the swell are very much in the open - the busloads of people coming from all directions, the lengthening of the festival area, the number of buses fielded by TTC to transport people, the shortage of food that forced revelers to patronize unregistered vendors, the mountains of garbage overflowing from bins, the long queues for food, the big number of cars parked within two kilometres of the festival, etcetera.

I talked with Rolly Mangante, the founding chairman of Taste of Manila, to get his impression about the size of the crowd. Well, he had one based on what the police told him. In utter disbelief, he said, the unidentified police officer estimated the festival was much bigger this year than the previous years, although he did not give a number. Fine.

But the moment came when the sea of humanity became an ocean of yelling, clapping, stomping, singing, dancing multitudes. And that's when the musical talents from the broadcast giant ABS-CBN-TFC performed their numbers. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ms1K7JYpzZk).

From then on, counting became impossible. Just imagine how big an ocean is and you'll get an idea how immense Taste of Manila was on its sixth year. (Copyright 2019. All Rights Reserved).