EdPam's triumph

WITH THE Abacan River back to its placid state, Angeles City stirred to life anew. Edgardo Pamintuan, with an overwhelming mandate as elected mayor, electrified his constituents with the clarion call Agyu Tamu (We Can!) to inspire confidence that the city could rise, phoenix-like, from the volcanic ashes.

Pamintuan was inspired by a few intrepid city entrepreneurs who refused “to heed the voice of reason” and stayed put in the city to rehabilitate their factories and revive their productivity, foremost of whom was Ruperto Cruz who resumed his manufacture and export of high-end furniture within 45 days after the eruption.

To jumpstart the local economy, Pamintuan and his confidant, the activist Alexander Cauguiran, hit the buttons that sparked the city’s vibrancy – the entertainment industry.

Thus was birthed Tigtigan, Terakan Keng Dalan, street dancing and music in the Mardi Gras mold.

The whole stretch of MacArthur Highway in Barangay Balibago was closed to traffic.

The strip shone bright again in a kaleidoscope of lights. Bands on a makeshift stage on the highway itself played all types of music, from country to rock, rhythm and blues to OPM. Restaurants set their tables on the sidewalks.

Food was aplenty. Beer flowed like – in the spirit of the times – lahar. Thousands rocked and rolled in a celebration of renewal, of rebirth.

The shroud of grief over the Pinatubo tragedy had been lifted – in Angeles City.

THAT WAS the capping piece sub-titled Happy days of the chapter Lahar! in our book Pinatubo: Triumph of the Kapampangan Spirit (2008).

Tigtigan, Terakan Keng Dalan marked a defining moment in the deathly struggle and ultimate victory of the Angeleno over the devastations of the Mt. Pinatubo eruptions.

Much similar to Bacolod City’s Masskara Festival which signature smiles defined that city’s rise from the hardships that came in the wake of the collapse of the sugar industry in the ‘80s, if I have my chronology right.

That Tigtigan, Terakan Keng Dalan became the signature festival of Angeles City was a testament to its lasting impact the psyche of the city residents, and a recognition of its prime value to their survival as a people.

So at its staging in the last weekend of October since 1992, Tigtigan, Terakan Keng Dalan serves as a look-back to the nights of fear and anxieties, to the days of hope and struggles until the rebirthing of the city now soaring in the firmament of economic development. Truly a cause for celebration. Of the very soul of the Angeleno in triumph.

Twenty-four years! Has it been that long since Tigtigan, Terakan Keng Dalan came to being and stirred Angeles City’s re-borning from the volcanic ashes? Aye, of the city’s abandonment by the American occupying forces that served its very cause of being?  

Angeles City did survive, and how! No, Angeles City even excelled its purely Sin City past. 

Twenty-four years, turning full circle from neophyte Mayor EdPam’s sowing the seeds to world-class Mayor EdPam’s reaping – and sharing – the fruits of the city’s toils and privations.

Aye, as much as the Angeleno’s, the triumph over the devastations of Mount Pinatubo is, rightfully, Pamintuan’s too.