27 September 2018 - Consul General Gilberto Asuque congratulated
the Filipino community in Banff and Canmore, Alberta for their successful
hosting of the Filipino food festival on Thursday that was attended by some 500
Filipinos and Canadians.
The Filipino Organization in the Rocky Mountains (FORM) led by its founder Mr. Jun Cacayuran (photo, right) briefed Consul General Asuque and Mr. Cameron Westhead, Member of the Legislative Assembly of Banff-Cochrane Constituency, on the strong community spirit and volunteer work of the Filipinos in Banff and Canmore in preparing the traditional Filipino fiesta cuisine.
The FORM members served lechon,
adobo, pancit, molo soup, lumpia, vegetable dishes and desserts of puto,
kutsinta, sapin-sapin, maha blanca, leche flan, buko pandan jelly and fruit
salad for the well-attended special community potluck dinner.
The Community Services Office
of the Banff Town Hall assisted the FORM in organizing the Filipino food
festival at the Banff Senior Center, which was one of the well-attended event (photo,
right) where the cue for the food hall extended up to the walk-way leading to
the center .
Consul General Asuque,
accompany by his wife Rosalie, met the staff of the Community Services Office
and some members of FORM (photo, left) before the opening of the food festival
for a briefing on the event.
Banff
is a resort town in the province of Alberta, located within Banff National
Park. It is located in Alberta's Rockies along the Trans-Canada Highway, approximately
126 km west of Calgary. At an elevation of 1,400 m to 1,630 m, Banff is the community with the
second highest elevation in Alberta after Lake Louise. The surrounding 6,500
square kilometers of parkland are home to wildlife including elk and grizzly
bears. Some 1000 Filipino workers
provide the majority of the manpower for the hotel and tourism industry in
Banff, many of them volunteered after their work schedules to support the FORM
in the hosting of the food festival.
In the conversation with Mr. Westhead MLA (photo, left), Consul General Asuque highlighted the significant contributions of the Filipino workers in Banff for the year-round success of the tourism and hotel and restaurant industry in the Rocky Mountains. Mr. Cacayuran works at the 5-star Fairmont Banff Springs in Banff where the Filipino workers comprise a significant number of the total staff. MLA Westhead recognized the valuable contributions of the Filipinos in the tourism and local economy of Banff and expressed support for moves in the MLA to welcome more Filipino workers for the hotel and restaurant industry in the Rocky Mountains.
