Electric Masskara 2012 to transform tourism into party

MASSKARA Festival director Eli Francis Tajanlangit said the Electric Masskara 2012 will transform the Tourism Strip into the longest street party.

He said, in the three-day event, the people will see “a distillation of the things that we have done and we have not done for the event.”

The Electric MasssKara will start from Friday(October 19) to Sunday (October 21).

For several years of staging the Electric MassKara, he said: “One can see new and old things, innovations and all of that because of our experience in the last years.”

Seven floats coming from different parts of Bacolod City will converge at the Tourism Strip along Lacson Street at 7 p.m. and transform the whole place into a stage during the first night of the Electric MassKara on Friday with the participation of the giant puppets of La Consolacion College (LCC) as an added attraction, he said.

He said the new event is called “Pagkilita-ay, Pakita-ay” which means “We meet and show off.”

“The idea is to showcase how Bacolod is where the seas and mountains meet. Thus, the lighted floats will carry figures and forms, creatures and characters from the seas on one hand and the mountains on the other,” he said.

The floats of Panasiatic Solutions at the Circumferential Road in Barangay Villamonte and Gaisano City on Araneta Street will start the parade from their respective places together with their drumbeaters and cheerers, he said.

Along the way, the float of Gaisano City which represents the sea will be joined by the float of Negros Occidental-Recoletos (UNO-R) from Lupit, while the float of Panasiatic which represents the mountain, will be joined by the floats of the University of St. La Salle (USLS) and the Colegio de San Agustin (CSA) groups.

IPI and Petronas floats will also join the mountain float from the north, he said.

He said the two main floats under the Majica MassKara 9 project titled “Ang Bukid Kag Bayabay sa Bacolod” representing the sea and mountains done by the Bacolod artists under Charlie Co from the concept of Peque Gallaga, will be the last to come in.

The two sets of floats will arrive at the Tourism Strip at 9 p.m. and the floats will stay in various places where it will be lighted at night from Saturday to Sunday, he said.

Streetdance competition

Tajanlangit said on Saturday, 10 schools will perform in the streetdance competition, while on Sunday, 15 barangays will join the competition from Libertad to Araneta Streets to the Public Plaza.

Tajanlangit said the plaza will also have major events.

The floats of IPI and Petronas will proceed to the plaza after the parade on Friday, he said.

Rialino Alisbo, dean of the La Consolacion College of Architecture, said on the highlight of the MassKara Festival on Sunday, all their 73 giant puppets will lead the streetdance participants during the parade at 1 p.m.

The puppets will also entertain guests along the Tourism Street from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m., Alisbo said. Carla N. Canet