MassKara 2024: MassKara Unmasked!

I spent five wonderful years of my childhood in Iloilo City, and would visit Bacolod, which was just a ferry ride away. I love its people, its food and its historical structures.

- JOANNE RAE M. RAMIREZ

My parents' friends would say Bacolod was more flamboyant than conservative Iloilo, and rich women had gems by the garapon.

Alas, the sugar crisis struck. But trust Bacolodnons to bounce back - with a smile!

True to its moniker the "City of Smiles," Bacolod has a festival of masks aptly named "MassKara," but the masks have smiles. No sad faces, no Money Heist type of masks. Just masks that lift the corners of one's lips and one's heart.

Historical sources say the festival was born in 1980, a time of extreme want and heartbreaking suffering for the majority of its people who relied on sugarcane for sustenance and survival.

Nowadays, when people talk about the "MassKara" Festival after a well-timed trip to Bacolod in Negros Occidental, hardly anyone starts their stories with the sugar crisis that caused famine in the province.

Instead, they come home with stories of colorful masks, electrifying street dances, all-night drinking and dancing - armed with bags of piayas, toasted polvoron and a host of other delicacies that turn story time into snack time. And if only for that, the MassKara Festival, which recently marked its 45th run in the "City of Smiles," has truly carried on its legacy.

As PeopleAsia managing editor Jose Paolo dela Cruz reminded me after his recent trip to Bacolod as a judge at the MassKara 2024 Arena Dance Competition finale, MassKara festival was born out of tragedy.