Winning a whopping
half a million pesos for taking the top plum, the Pasaka Festival was
already a crowd favorite during the more than two hours street dancing
held around the city, and disappointed Dulag’s Karatong Festival as
the latter was gunning to take the crown in this year’s Kasadyaan
after winning 5th place in two major national festival competitions
just some months back.
Tanauan Mayor Roque
Tiu said he was surprised by the energy and enthusiasm displayed by
their contingent but disclosed Pasaka Festival has been aiming to take
the top spot for several years now and earn the opportunity to compete
in other festival competition such as the Sinulog in Cebu City and the
Aliwan Fiesta in Manila.
“I am very, very happy
our contingent won this year because this is one way that we can gain
entry to other national festival competitions particularly for the
Aliwan Fiesta where contigents can join only per invitation and have
to win first in major festivals such as the Kasadyaan,” Mayor Tiu
said.
Represented by
students from the Tanauan National High School, Pasaka Festival
performed a colorful ritual honoring the patron Sr. Sto. Niño for the
bountiful catches from the sea. One of Tanauan’s main livelihood is
sourced from the sea as it lies facing the marine-life rich
Pacific Ocean.
Dulag’s Karatong
Festival settled as first runner up for the second time now. It was
also a runner-up in last year’s Kasadyaan to the newly-elevated Hall
of Fame Buyogan Festival of Abuyog, Leyte.
It earned P300,000 for
taking the second spot and would still join in upcoming national
festival competition such as the Sinulog Festival in
Cebu next year. However, it would not be able to represent the
province in the Aliwan Fiesta next year as the two spots given by
Manila Broadcasting Company, Aliwan’s organizers, are already given to
Buyogan Festival as Aliwan’s defending champion, and to Pasaka
Festival as this year’s Leyte Kasadyaan Festival grand champion.
Karatong Festival was
also judged as the Best in Dance Parade and was awarded with another
P100,000 cash prize. Both prizes were received by Dulag Mayor Manuel
Sia Que.
Meanwhile, getting the
third spot was Bato’s Bato-Balani Festival which was one of the most
applauded performance this year. Settling for fifth place last year,
Bato’s colorful portrayal of paying homage to their patron as well as
their gigantic and vibrant props earned them a spot two notch higher
than they captured last year.
Bato Mayor Luis Kuizon
was on hand to receive the prize of P100,000 and said he is happy with
this year’s success of their Bato-Balani contingent in the
Pintados-Kasadyaan Festival of Festivals. The Bato Balani contigent
was also judged as the Best in Festival Music which earned them
another P100,000.
After being elevated
to the Hall of Fame, Abuyog’s Buyogan Festival joined this year only
as guest contingent and was awarded P100,000 by the Department of
Tourism in the region for winning various national festival
contingents, bringing honor and pride to the province and the region.
Buyogan is set to
perform in Singapore in the coming months as disclosed by Abuyog Mayor
Octavio Traya.
On the other hand, in
the Pintados-based category, Eastern Visayas State University bested
eight other contingents and won P50,000. Placing second was the
contingent SPAS of Sto. Niño, Tanauan, Leyte and placing third was
Leyte Normal University. They received cash prizes of P30,000 and
P20,000 respectively courtesy of the Pintados Foundation, Inc.
Meanwhile, in the
Merrymakers category, Colegio de La Salle won the first place,
followed by ACLC and Tacloban Institute of Electronics. They each
received cash prizes of P10,000; P7,000 and P3,000 respectively.
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Tanauan's
Pasaka Festival captured this year's 14th Kasadyaan Festival of
Festivals held at the Leyte Sports Development Center in
Tacloban City. Pasaka earned a spot to represent the province
and their town in major national festival competition such as
the Sinulog in Cebu and the Aliwan Fiesta in Manila. The Tanauan
contigent earned a whopping half a million pesos for taking the
top spot. Officials of the Manila Broadcasting Company,
organizers of the Aliwan Fiesta, were also on hand to personally
extend their invitation to the winning contingents.
(PMRC photo) |
