Talk about a travesty.
Look, aren’t festivals supposed to be celebrations of something good? The pagans in pre-Christian times at least know how to celebrate these things. They celebrated when the harvest was good. When a new leader was born. When the chief screwed one of his daughters.
Whatever.
At least, there was a valid cause for celebration.
And now the MassKara Festival. It was first celebrated because MV Don Juan sank, bringing along with it an important figures of Negros, including a scion of a political family in Bacolod. I would like to think that the people celebrated because the city is one member short of a tyrant, but heck no. That would be purely delusional. Instead, the leaders grieved because of the loss. And all these at the time that the sugar industry was also going the way of MV Don Juan.
That was a double whammy for the elite in Negros. One of them died, and the industry that paid for their mansions, luxury cars and Chanels was in deep sh*t. So what to do?
Why celebrate! Give masks to the people! Smiling masks! To hide the grief!
Don’t know about you, but when my pockets are empty, and somebody I love just died, I don’t pop out the champagne (or the Coca-Cola – hehe). I would find the means to work harder, mourn the dead, and bury them. (And when you come to think of it, what if Mr Scion survived? What if only the common tao were killed in the tragedy? I don’t think we would even have the MassKara festival. Nobody grieves for the nobodies except their fellow nobodies).
That’s why, come October, I really don’t feel the need to celebrate along with the rest of the city. How can I, when I remember what the festival was all about?
As I said, a travesty.
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