MARIBEL U. SINGCA
CITY OF SAN FERNANDO–This will be the busiest season for lantern makers especially in the anticipation and preparation for the “Ligligan Parul” or the Giant Lantern Festival as celebrated every year and supported by the provincial government headed by Governor Lilia Nanay Pineda.
There would be ten participating barangays this year, Barangays Sto. Niño, Dolores, San Jose, San Nicolas, San Juan, Del Pilar, Sta. Lucia, Calulut, Telabastagan, and Del Carmen.
The participating barangays will vie for the most awaited event of the year on December 11 at the Robinson’s Starmills.
Each participant of the Giant Lantern Festival was given a subsidy of P170,000.00 by the Lantern Festival Foundation and the city government.
Mang Erning said in an interview that the preparation for the said competition would take about two months and twenty seven men work the entire time.
“Governor has pledge to expend the P195,000.00 budget for the Sto. Niño alone”, Mang Erning said.
He added, that the giant lantern should not be over 20.5 feet and not lower than 19.5 feet.
It can be retold, that a certain Ernesto David Quiwa, General Manager of Ernesto Erning Quiwa’s Christmas Lantern, brought San Fernando lanterns to fame when he first promoted the famous lantern and brought it to gas stations and delicacies center in Metro Manila.
Since then, San Fernando lanterns became known not only in Pampanga but in different places and international as well.
Lantern vendors filled the long stretch of Mc Arthur Highway in Dolores exhibiting their various masterpieces shining and shimmering at night.
The streets of San Fernando are again gleaming with picturesque and lively multi-colored lanterns hanging on high poles, on streetlights, houses, business establishments, buildings, restaurants and the like.
It has always been a Filipino tradition that when “Ber Months” approach, Christmas carols buzz everywhere, Christmas decors hang on the walls, Christmas trees draped with glittery and colorful trimmings.
