ANOS Fonacier quietly left the topsy-turvy world he had lived in for almost a century.
He had indelibly marked himself in Cebu’s recent past, that period when “the little island in the Pacific” began to drift in the consciousness of travelers, that same period when Marcos cronyism was either boon or bane.
Approaching 90, Anos Fonacier had little memory of the past. He died in his sleep, under the comfort of the blanket his wife Josefina gave him the night before.
Boom said his dad had prostate cancer, throat cancer, kidney stones, Parkinson’s Disease and Alzheimer’s.
Anos fought them all through his geriatric years but finally yielded yesterday.
“We were hoping Dad goes before the aray comes in,” Boom told Sun.Star Cebu by phone.
When his nurse checked on him at dawn, Anos had slipped away.
Burial instructions
Boom said his dad left instructions on how to handle his body: No embalming, no viewing, no fanfare, immediate cremation.
Anos Fonacier was the man who blazed the tourism trail of Cebu and Bohol in the early 1980s. And he was not even Cebuano; he was Ilokano.
Together with other investors, he built the first five-star hotel in Cebu, the Cebu Plaza Hotel (now Marco Polo Plaza Cebu).
He also built the first ever commercial beach resort in Mactan Island, the Tambuli Beach Club, transforming the rocky area into a sun-kissed getaway.
In the south of Cebu, he built the Argao Beach Club, using the same concept he had for Tambuli Beach Club.
When he built the Bohol Beach Club in 1984, he introduced Panglao Island to the international world.
He had run a tour service in Manila and with his connections, offered the first charter flights into Cebu from Hong Kong, Japan and the United States.
On Dec. 5, 2003, the Department of Tourism bestowed on Fonacier the Kalakbay Award for his entrepreneurship and dedication to put Cebu and Bohol in the international tourism map.
“Friendly buy-out”
Tourism endeavors aside, Fonacier co-founded Sun.Star with Jesus B. “Sonny” Garcia Jr. and Paulino Franco in 1982.
After the Edsa Revolution in 1986, he had his shares in Sun.Star bought out by Garcia. Franco did the same with his shares.
Garcia said it was a “friendly buyout.”
Fonacier had once described the establishment of Sun.Star to be “a bigger feather on my cap than what I had done for tourism.”
“I have very pleasant memories of Anos,” Garcia said yesterday when informed of Fonacier’s death.
Garcia said that not many people know it but the altar of the Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Parish in Capitol, Cebu City held special meaning to Fonacier.
Fonacier, an Aglipayan priest, had the altar built.
Anos whose name means “patience” in Ilokano, was named adopted son of Cebu City in 1994.