Volume 3, Issue No. 57
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 Wednesday, June 8, 2022
~ The Filipino community continues to be regaled by serious-looking individuals doing all kinds of antics to grab attention. Comedians they are not but the manner they conduct themselves invariably makes us chuckle, which is the polite way to describe it so as not to be offensive. At its heart, however, is the desperation evident in their every move to revive a dead horse, so to speak.
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DID THEY SNEAK INTO THE PIDC PARADE?
Cheerleaders of Taste of Manila: A Pathetic Bunch
By ROMEO P. MARQUEZ
Editor, The Filipino Web Channel
“Every lame horse dreams of being Pegasus.” ―
The parade was called as the program was progressing towards the end of the whole-day picnic PIDC had organized on Saturday, June 4, to celebrate the return of its annual "salo-salo" and the observance of Filipino Heritage Month in Canada. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwLwcPe-CaA).
The cheering squad bearing a small Taste of Manila (ToM) banner stood out in the crowd for being just there, trying to be cute in their green shirts, and doing nothing worthwhile to enhance the first outdoor, in-person get-together by the Filipino community.
Obviously, their presence was to promote the moribund ToM, which for six years prior to the pandemic had been the go-to street festival in the Greater Toronto Area. At the height of its success, ToM went bankrupt due to many factors, including mismanagement by inexperienced officers and alleged corruption by some.
What ToM had been as the biggest crowd-getter from 2014 through 2019 has now reduced itself to being an attention-grabber. This role played out well in the brief PIDC parade. All fired up, the cheerleaders swayed, shrieked, and waved, their faces nearly unrecognizable in their large sunglasses and oversized hats.
Perhaps it's a vivid illustration of what ails ToM and the spurious not-for-profit IEC (International Entertainment Company) that promotes itself as the new organizers for the festival proposed to be held sometime in August. (Full story at: https://filwebchannelmagazine.blogspot.com/2022/05/is-iec-legit-nfp-org.html).
Even as they go around mouthing "tuloy ang saya" (roughly, the fun continues), there's no concrete guarantee it would. It has yet to make a public showing of its program, guests, and corporate and individual sponsors.
ToM's latest setback was the "cease and desist" order by city authorities stopping ToM from using Toronto's corporate logo on ToM posters and website, understandably so as it conveys the impression the City officially endorses the planned festival when in fact, it "is not providing financial support to the Taste of Manila." (Full story at: https://filwebchannelmagazine.blogspot.com/2022/05/taste-of-manila-organizers-get-warning.html).
As pathetic-looking as the cheerleaders were, was the flimsy gazebo-like ToM booth located so far out of the main expanse, almost unnoticeable except for the two unidentified souls taking shelter from the blistering sun. (See collage).
If IEC projects ToM to be big again, why would it participate in a competitive event - to get noticed, to steal the crowd, to recruit sponsors, to make a show of stupidity? The answer is all of the above. The lack of confidence in its own street festival is crystal clear.
Its presence at PIDC only illustrates the desperation the IEC headed by a certain Cecille Araneta is willing to take to move ToM from relative obscurity to mainstream attention again. By the way, she's the same person who wrongly and ignorantly told an interviewer that the war relic vehicle jeepney is "the national car of the Philippines." (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdTnX700_a8).
I was tempted to make an example of a recent pronouncement by an IEC partner named Mondee, aka Mon Datol, who said something moronic about copyright after his group was confronted for stealing copyrighted film footage from The Filipino Web Channel. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_398v7dDQhQ).
He defended the steal in this wise, but it's better to hear it from the horse's mouth, as the saying goes, so here it is at this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qd02DO503DU starting at the 2:06 mark.
At Earl Bales Park, I shot videos of everyone and every organization, including the ToM contingent. Now, if I follow Mondee's fatuous wisecrack, I needed to ask each individual in those videos permission so I can upload them on my YouTube channel.
Is this what Mondee wants? But Rolly Mangante, the claimant as ToM founder who is apparently his boss, was nowhere in sight. By Mondee's flawed reasoning, I had to have Mangante's approval for an upload because he supposedly owned the copyright for everything about ToM. It's preposterous.
The cheering squad must have been looking for the videos I took of them during the parade. Sorry guys and dolls, those will not see the light of day on my channel.
However, if you persist in your asinine behaviour and show yourselves in your jumbled best, I might reconsider. After all, we need a laugh or two in these times. (Copyright 2022. All Rights Reserved).
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