People love the Masskara; so do the hotels. It is enormous entertainment for the people – carefree, even decadent fun – after a year of long, laborious work. On the other hand, it brings in booming business for the hotels in this very laid-back city. The Casino Filipino Hotel, one of the more reputable hotels in Bacolod, has early on filled up its rooms with reservations during the Masskara weekend. The hotel is right in the heart of the Goldenfields Commercial Complex in Singcang, Bacolod City, a shouting distance from the airport, although when night falls the din and bustle of this gem-like village of restaurants and nightclubs shuts off the rest of the city and Greenfields becomes its own little island of lights and merriment.
Also in the evenings Casino Filipino Hotel rings with the sounds of the gaming tables and machines, and on most nights the blaring music of big-time bands and concerts by well-known singers (more recently, they had Pops Fernandez and Ogie Alcasid). Casino Filipino Hotel, the first and only hotel operated by Casino Filipino in the country, understands entertainment, which is what the Masskara festival is also all about.
Which is why, according to Casino Filipino Hotel manager Silverio de la Cruz, "Pagcor will always support its host city in its tourism development and promotion."
And not only in the specific thrust to make Bacolod a festival destination. On another level, or even in the larger scheme of things, the shining ambition is to make Bacolod a business and convention center in the region. De la Cruz, who’s also a top officer of the hotel and restaurant association in Negros, has joined hands with resort owners, hotel managers, travel industry practitioners and tourism officers in the different cities and municipalities to form Attain (Alliance of Tourism and Travel Associates in Negros), with the avowed aim of promoting greater tourism in the region, specifically in the field of meetings and conventions.
Lending their influence to the alliance are Ruth Cruz of the Prominence Inn Hotel and a travel operator, John Marie Lizares of the Convention Plaza Hotel, Bobby Balde of L’Fisher, and Silver de la Cruz. The alliance’s first activity was the tourism conference held at the Bacolod Convention Plaza Hotel attended by over a thousand representatives from the region. "There surfaced common problems (although these were not exactly unexpected), like the inaccessibility of tourist sites and the lack of promotions of these sites, and the need to develop indigenous handicrafts that tourists look for," says De la Cruz.
Silver, whose job as manager of the Casino Filipino Hotel is largely in support of the F&B requirements of the casino and helping in the tourism promotions of the host city, says, "It’s not simply because the Department of Tourism has enjoined business to play a significant role in local tourism promotion." Doing so, in fact, is essential to their business survival. Whereupon, he says, Pagcor often figures in the picture as major sponsor.
The alliance intends to organize major trade and tourism and business conferences. On its limited budget it has produced brochures for city and provincial tours that, more importantly, also indicate hotels with facilities that can support local or international conventions and conferences.
It will stir things up much more, indeed, if you hold your conference to coincide with the Masskara festival on the third week of October.