Volume 3, Issue No. 26
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 and beyond . . . . . .
Our latest as of Monday, January 17, 2022
~ "Those were the days my friend, we thought they'd never end . . . " - that 1968 song by Mary Hopkin comes to mind when remembering days of yore that had been Taste of Manila (ToM), the ethnic revelry that had dominated Toronto's Filipino community from 2014 to 2019. It was "the largest Filipino street festival outside of the Philippines", says Teresa M. Torralba who coined the phrase, and the actual brains behind ToM's mixed themes of cuisine, culture, entertainment, and a sprinkling of politics. Had it been managed properly by organizers and its ambitious goals followed, ToM could have transformed the growing diaspora and elevated it into a powerful political force, one that's just not fully engrossed in fleeting entertainment.
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CANADA'S LARGEST FILIPINO STREET FESTIVAL
Taste of Manila's Missed Opportunities
(Second of Three Parts)
By ROMEO P. MARQUEZ
Editor, The Filipino Web Channel
“How short the happy moments seem and how endless the sad ones.” ―
More about Little Manila in these videos:
1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hsJFlnNerVA; 2. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eACkDCFUVwY;
3. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2fI0c11aO0; 4. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aOgDtLd6ec.
No single event by Filipinos had attracted so much attention and patronage because of a refreshing new look in conducting it, i.e. free of charge, easy availability of public transportation; no dress code; wide, open spaces along a major road artery, convenient access to supermarkets and restaurants, freedom of movement, etcetera. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HjftzI3iQ14).
Politicians had seen its promise. City, provincial, and federal leaders eyeing elective office made sure they were visibly recognized and acknowledged in ToM's every staging, starting in 2014 and up to its last performance in 2019, just four months before the coronavirus was officially declared a pandemic, thus COVID-19.
Largely unseen in their attempts to ingratiate themselves to the electorate was the prospect of getting broad support. To the politicians, ToM, with its growing popularity, basically was key to their success, a knowledge that apparently has escaped notice by organizers who felt sufficiently comfortable being praised before the mass of fans.
As a matter of fact, in 2015, a federal election year, the then ruling Conservative Party (or Tories) caused a ruckus when its candidates for parliament jumped in at the head of the parade of participants, relegating Philippine diplomats to a secondary role in disregarded of protocol, and led the march as if they owned it.
The optics created the impression that ToM was a Conservative partisan. It actually sparked revulsion that might have been one of the causes of the party's loss in the following October election where the Liberals (also called Grits) led by Justin Trudeau, now the current prime minister, garnered the majority in Parliament with 184 seats against the Tories' 99.
For some, however, the view was from a narrow perspective. ToM could be their shortcut to aggrandizing themselves. The prospect of profiting from ToM and taking home huge amounts of money was just too overwhelming to ignore. And ToM was the cash cow. (Related video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aOgDtLd6ec).
Not a big surprise either. For example, unconfirmed reports had started to trickle that Officer A earned in two days the amount he had to work for in one year. Officer B had amassed enough to acquire modern-day conveniences. Officer C had flown the coop to start a business somewhere.
ToM, through its supposedly charitable arm, the Philippine Cultural Community Centre (PCCC), did not have official (as opposed to fabricated) financial reports, and if it did, those were under wraps. Within the organization, there was firm resistance to revealing ToM's revenues. (VIdeo at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I5bqjpeNJps).
I recall the secret email exchanges between two board members of PCCC. One stated, and I quote: "It's not proper de quorum (sic) /attitude to disclosed (sic) confidential matter to people who are not part of our organization. It's a common sense in any business owner that they don't want other people to know sensitive issue about their business".
To which the other guy responded in English and Tagalog, and I quote: "Tama . . . everything should stay confidential within us. Kahit kay Mrs. 'wag nating sabihin". (Full story at: https://www.balita.ca/taste-of-manila-goes-distasteful-one-street-festival-and-three-financial-reports/).
Even as ToM had already achieved a historic feat in the Filipino community in its second year in 2015 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=De6MOZ6Vqlw), the year 2016 attested to its going mainstream. The number of attendees spiraled to heights never seen before by any combination of events by Filipino associations.
Still beaming with pride for having trounced the Tories nine months earlier, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau swooped down from his parliamentary office in Ottawa and rubbed shoulders with common folks at ToM's third staging in Little Manila on Saturday, August 20, 2016. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWQr7tlg5pk).
The following day, Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynn dropped by ToM (video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYjRO6DXgNc) and hobnobbed with the crowd, had selfies with individuals and groups, which practically cemented the festival's status as the leading Filipino social and cultural event in the province.
As success after success came through, ToM was slowly disintegrating inside. Mutual distrust was evident among its officers and eventually came to a head months later when PCCC, its organizing charity, was disbanded, coming as it did at a worse time when ToM teetered for lack of funds.
Five weeks before ToM's 2018 staging, organizers announced that the festival was being shelved due to mounting liquidity problems. It could not raise the $50,000 shortfall to cover the initial cost to stage it, which was estimated at $200,000, an amount to pay expenses for city services like health and sanitation, transportation, and police.
At the very last minute, however, Toronto Mayor John Tory and Councillor James Pasternak whose district covers Little Manila, came to the rescue. "We're not prepared to let Taste of Manila go by the wayside," Tory declared. "Taste of Manila deserves to be kept going," the mayor added.
And with that, ToM emerged from near death. But that was to be the last ToM under the PCCC banner. (Videos at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8aLg4yzAljs and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cTMMjhsgmoE).
A newly-minted organization, the independent Philippine Legacy and Cultural Alliance (PLACA), has been constituted by former PCCC members to take over ToM starting in August 2019. (Copyright 2022. All Rights Reserved).
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