MACAU IN THE PHILIPPINESBy Stephanie Dychiu
Casino culture invades the former Clark Air Base.
When China came under Communist rule in 1949, among the many things declared illegal along with free speech and organized religion was gambling. A bitter sacrifice for the vast nation that invented mah-jong, for whom betting is as natural as breathing. The state lottery was a sorry substitute.
Many decades of repressed compulsion went by, until the day the Portuguese gave Macau back to China in 1999. It was like the floodgates of heaven—hell?—had opened up. And just in time to catch the wave of economic prosperity that was sweeping through the land where one-fifth of humanity lives. Even back then, it was obvious the casinos on Macau’s 29 square kilometers of territory were not going to be enough.
Spawn of Sin City
How to grow? The rest of mainland China was not an option, because of the Communist ban on gambling. And so the bookies’ march toward other parts of Asia began, particularly Southeast Asia, including the Philippines, and the Clark Freeport.
Of the ten biggest hotels in the world, eight are casino hotels, and they are all in Las Vegas. The biggest is the MGM Grand, followed by the Luxor, Mandalay Bay, and The Venetian.
Macau is patterned after Las Vegas. Its biggest casino hotel is also called The Venetian, patterned after The Venetian of Las Vegas. Clark is being patterned after Macau. It needs its own Venetian.
Hence, Fontana.
The world of casino hostelry is all about replication, and if there is one thing the Chinese are great at, it’s copying the best, then doing it better. And cheaper. That’s why Macau now earns more gambling revenue than Las Vegas, and that’s why Clark will probably turn into Macau. Fontana is Clark’s Flamingo, its Hotel Lisboa—the embryonic enterprise that will spawn a new polestar of gaming.
Casino junketFontana first opened in the late 1990s, under Filipino owners. Predictably, it got caught in a nasty tug-of-war between local businessmen and government officials. It was eventually sold to the Hong Kong-based Jimei Group in 2004. Having previously taken over Fort Ilocandia in Laoag, Ilocos Norte, the Jimei Group was familiar with the rocky terrain of Philippine politics, and calmly set about remaking Fontana in Macau’s image. Planeloads of Chinese and Korean tourists started landing at the Diosdado Macapagal Airport, and Clark became an official stop on Asia’s glittering casino junket trail.
A casino junket is a trip that packages hotel and airfare to a well-known gambling destination. The price of the junket usually depends on the amount a tourist commits to wager while on the trip. For high rollers whose minimum bets run in the millions, a junket operator can easily make a profit even if he gives away the trip for free.
Jack Lam, the founder of the Jimei Group, knows junkets.
He is said to have made his early fortune running casino junkets to Macau in the 1980s. He started as a representative bringing clients to Stanley Ho's Hotel Lisboa, then eventually made enough money to operate his own VIP room at the hotel. In the 1990s, he began running junkets to Subic and Manila. His holdings in the Philippines today include the Heritage Hotel and Casino in Manila and the Waterfront Airport Hotel and Casino in Cebu, in addition to Fontana and Fort Ilocandia. Overseas, the Jimei Group runs hotels, clubs, and casinos in Seoul, Macau, Hong Kong, Shenzen, Guangzhou, Shanghai, and Beijing.
Jimei spent billions rebuilding Fontana in the likeness of its other hotel-gaming properties in China. As soon as a guest drives through the main gate, where the big green Fontana logo now sports Chinese characters, he is transported to a different country. The street signs are in Chinese with small English translations. The oversized terra cotta planters have been painted Chinese gold. The people running operations are Chinese. The clientele is mostly Chinese.
Which is not to say that the present Fontana, aesthetically speaking, is referencing China. As mentioned earlier, the peg is Venice.
A gambler’s dream of glamor
Venice begins at the entrance of the refurbished Fontana clubhouse, where a pair of white plaster-cast lions flank the door. Is this a nod to the winged lion of San Marco that is seen all over Venice? Quite. Except these are feng shui lions, or the so-called “Fu dogs” that guard Chinese temples and their modern-day equivalents: banks, corporate offices, department stores . . . casino-hotels.
The doorman is wearing a turban but is clearly Filipino. Is Fontana channeling Venice, or the Venice of the East (Udaipur)? Doesn't matter. A trip to Fontana requires the same suspension of disbelief as a trip to Disneyland. Is Mickey Mouse a real mouse?
Looking down at the lobby of the Fontana clubhouse is a ceiling painted sky blue with wispy white clouds—a classic feature of casino-hotel design, meant to mimic the feeling of being outdoors on a bright sunny day, so patrons don’t snap out of the casino trance to look for natural light. The Venetians of Las Vegas and Macau even have indoor Grand Canals with gondolas floating blithely under a fake blue sky. Fontana has not advanced to such levels of grandiosity yet. It still uses neon pink cove lighting to make the front desk glow like a nuclear reactor in the lobby.
Faux art’s sake
There is a reason why neon is the favored gas for lighting up the tawdry districts of the world. Neon is cheap, and neon means cheap. After years spent enduring a reputation of sleaze induced by its galaxy of neon signs, Las Vegas tried to counter the flash with some culture. Casino magnates bought Monets and Renoirs to put inside their new hotels. Exhibits of museum artifacts were mounted. The Guggenheim was contracted to open a gallery inside The Venetian.
There are similar attempts at artiness in Fontana. Strewn throughout the property are Renaissance sculptures, frescos, paintings, a Van Gogh masterpiece or two, Doric columns from the Parthenon, mosaic floors of ancient Rome—all replicas, of course. Everything is plastic, laminate, or wood, painted over to look like gold, bronze, silver, or marble. The world of casino hostelry is all about replication. The need to keep building, building, building is so urgent that little time can be wasted making repros look more authentic. That’s not what casino tourists are after. The Las Vegas Guggenheim closed just a few years after it opened.
Clark’s wager
The funds being poured into the build-up of Fontana have trickled to the communities around Clark. Contractors are busy, employment is up. By the end of 2009, a new hotel will add 500 rooms to the 450 villas already in the leisure complex. The shops and restaurants of Angeles are doing good business with tourists. There is a reason why casino-hotels are the biggest hotels in the world: they really do bring in the numbers.
But at what cost?
At the awards dinner of the 7th Jimei Invitational Golf Tournament, I walked into Fontana's Golden Pavillion restaurant and my eyes were assaulted by the twin Venus di Milo statues flanking the stage. I walked over and tapped them to see what they were made of—resin, covered in goldish paint.
I looked around at the groups of Filipinos and Chinese chattering animatedly over squid balls and cold cuts. I tried to count the number of local waitstaff serving drinks. And I told myself maybe it doesn’t matter, if it doesn’t bother anyone. At least for now.
(The text for this article originally appeared in Filgolf magazine, May-June 2009.)
