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Thursday, March 13, 2003
So long, hope it's not goodbye
By Jenara Regis Newman
For a whole generation (and more) of Cebuanos, the city has always had Cebu Plaza, up there in the hills, reaching up to the sky. It has been the venue of wedding receptions and debuts, of graduations and conventions, of anniversaries and fashion and art shows, of concerts and Santacruzans, and a whole lot of other activities a bustling city like Cebu cannot seem to do without.
In the early 1970s, Nivel Hills was almost a wilderness. Before the decade ended, Cebu Plaza Hotel was built, a low-rise building that hugged the contours of the hillside. It was a welcome addition to Cebu’s growing suburban landscape. In 1982, the hotel’s high rise was to dominate the Nivel Hills’ skyline while the hotel itself was to become the main hub of the city’s social life, even when it changed hands in 1987 from Anos Fonacier to Pathfinder Holdings.
Engr. Toto Chavez, who has been with the hotel since Nov. 1, 1981, says it is ironic that he never saw President Marcos in the hotel when the hotel was rumored, during Fonacier’s days, to be owned by him. But other Presidents came and slept there: Fidel Ramos, Joseph Estrada. Both Cory Aquino and Gloria Macapagal Arroyo had also been to the hotel, says PR manager Aissa de la Cruz, but they did not sleep there. And now, they’ll never get to sleep there, for Cebu Plaza Hotel is closing down at midnight of March 15.
Marietta Bucao, the hotel’s treasury head, says she has been with the hotel a month short of 20 years while Paul Catimpuhan, F&B supervisor, has been with Plaza since 1985. They recall the nice “inato” ways of the Fonaciers, father and son, who would always ask how they were and who would give up their salaries for the employes to share. They and Toto agree that what they like most about working for Cebu Plaza is the camaraderie, and that is what they will miss most of all, and the main reason they all feel sad about the hotel’s closure. Marietta says she had several opportunities for going abroad, but she chose to remain with the hotel, precisely for the feeling of warm fellowship she has found there. When the hotel closes, Marietta says she will wait to see if it reopens as a hotel and then she will apply, just like Paul who says he would like to enjoy a few months of jobless existence and then perhaps go into business, if the place does not reopen as a hotel. Toto has no problem for the moment because as maintenance manager, he has been asked to stay on to care for the equipment: the generator, boiler, air conditioning system, the lights, the water system, etc. etc. The rest of the employes (278 regulars and 270 extras) will have to fend for themselves and it is for these others that Paul, Marietta, Toto and Aissa are worried about: for most of them Cebu Plaza is their only means of livelihood.
Aissa says the hotel has 60 rooms at the low rise and 323 guest rooms and suites at the high rise which has a Presidents Club. It also has a Sports Center with two tennis courts, a shooting range, an 18-hole mini golf course, a jogging trail and a children’s playground. It has two swimming pools, one by the high rise and the other below the low rise, beside the native food outlet, Lantaw. And for its last day, Cebu Plaza will no longer be checking in guests, but it will have four affairs: the graduation rites of St. Paul’s College at the Visayas Ballroom in the morning and Charmaine Basubas’ debut in the evening, in the same venue; the wedding reception of Gonzalo del Monte and Rosalie Tizon at Lantaw, and the debut of Irene Young’s cousin, Michelle, at the Top of the Plaza.
With media friends, I‘ve attended a lot of beautiful and fun gatherings in Cebu Plaza: dinners at Lantaw, lunches at Café Tartanilla, merienda and concerts at the Lobby. We even had occasional forays into the realm of the youth, Bai Disco and Pards, when they were still open. I‘ve attended a variety of activities at the Visayas Ballroom: wedding receptions (the last being that of Jerald and Christina Garcia), concerts, debuts, corporate affairs, family reunions. I remember going up in Plaza’s scenic elevator to the Top of the Plaza, where once a satellite casino of Pagcor was located, and where American Express had its reception. For all the fun I‘ve had at the Plaza, it never really occurred to me to check in there: what for when I‘m a Cebu resident? But when a friend, Tina C., a month ago asked me to spend a night there to bid goodbye to the place, I readily acquiesced and found that the rooms compare easily with the best I‘ve been to abroad, perhaps even roomier and better lighted. It’s a comfortable hotel to be in, and it’s sad to see it go.
And so I made my private goodbye to Cebu Plaza. I went down to Lantaw, enjoying the flowering kalachuchis of the Sports Center along the way, then up to the low rise with its neatly landscaped grounds, up to the high rise again, following a trail of brilliantly blooming bougainvilleas and up to the steps leading to the high rise, with bandera españolas in full bloom in the hillside garden. And all the while, snatches of a Sinatra song kept going around and around my head: The party’s over, the candles flicker and dim…
Cebu Plaza is “over”, its lights will shut down at midnight Saturday night, all its outlets will close, as well as all its shops and service facilities (except its Japanese restaurant, Yumeya-Kihei, which is not Plaza owned): will it resurrect as Cebu Plaza or some other hotel? A lot of Cebuanos hope so.
(March 13, 2003 issue)
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