I heard the news about the opening ceremony over my car radio. The radio announcer gave instructions to motorists to avoid portions of Iznart, Muelle Loney, Guanco, and JM Basa Streets as these were the routes of the opening parade. Of course, no traffic will be allowed to pass the front of Freedom Grandstand as the program will be held there.
I had an appointment along Plaza Libertad. So I left my car in the Provincial Capitol parking area and just walked to my destination.
JM Basa St. taken on a Sunday morning last August 2009 from the Freedom Grandstand.
Walking along Calle Real was without hassle. Calle Real (literally Royal Street), the Iloilo City strip spanned by JM Basa St., Iznart St., Plaza Libertad and Plazoleta Gay, is no longer as crowded as before. People who come here are mostly after business transactions. Few come to shop as it is more convenient and safer to shop in the malls. The City government offices are temporarily transferred farther away. A number of the old art deco buildings are now abandoned and crumbling, or used as ukay-ukay stores. On the eastern side of JM Basa St., what used to be panciterias and textile stores, open only after dark as seedy girlie joints or gay bars. The stores on the western side seem to fare better. Socorro Drugstore, Seven-Seven, Commoner, Sam’s, Shanghai - stores I’ve known since childhood - are still operating. Cinema, Allegro, and Golden Superama - the best movie houses before – are now Korean stores selling cheap items that easily break. Only one movie house is still operating. It shows old bold flicks which could not be shown in movie houses inside the malls. Hoskyn’s Compound, touted as the first establishment in the Philippines to operate as a mall, still exists. Keben Theatre is now a computer school and a host of small offices and clinics. Summerhouse which used to serve the best pancit lomi in Iloilo, transferred to another location. Dainty’s still exists and still serves the best pancit as before. But while other popular restaurants have sprung branches and have gone into franchising, Dainty’s remains as a hole in the Calle Real wall but nevertheless has maintained its loyal patrons. The IN restaurant before was Fatima. What is left of it now is just the concrete Fatima signage. Where it operated before is now a hardware store. But Roberto’s, the small restaurant popular for its take-out counter, still attracts queues of customers, like before. Vendors hawked their wares and I could smell whiffs of peanuts fried with garlic and cheap apples which reminded me of Christmas. When I was a small kid, apples only appear in Iloilo during Christmas time. My parents would bring us to Calle Real to shop and Calle Real smelled of apples. We bought the cheap smaller variety because we could not afford the bigger Red Delicious. We only ate apples during Christmas.
I was disappointed when I reached my appointment because the traffic along the route seemed normal. There was no parade that choked the traffic. I could have taken my car all the way to my meeting place.
(Above photos)An Ati tribe waiting for its turn to perform, and the same tribe while performing.
But it was a different story when my appointment was over. As I retraced my steps towards the Freedom Grandstand, a wall of humanity four-persons deep blocked my way. The Dinagyang opening program had started and traffic was rerouted. Actually, the crowd now was a small fraction compared to the crowd during the Dinagyang culmination activity. But nevertheless traffic could not pass through. And I was thankful I parked my car farther away.
(Above photos)No these are not parts of a performance, but some tribe members perched on mid-street fences to get a better view of the performances.
The afternoon was hot and humid. In this condition, walking along Calle Real in business attire was uncomfortable indeed. But seeing the usual places and happenings that evoked memories of the old happy childhood days when my only problem was how not to take a bath without being noticed by my mother, the walk was worth all the sweat and the grime in my collar.@
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