Happy Steps travel blog

Dumaguete famous landmarks and tourist attractions

Continued from Road trip: Bacolod (Negros Occidental) to Dumaguete (Negros Oriental)

After about 5 hours of road travel from Bacolod with our trusty van, we arrived in Dumaguete, fondly known as the “City of Gentle People”. Compared to most Visayan cities such as Bacolod or Iloilo, Dumaguete is less crowded. The first thing I noticed about this city is its simple laidback atmosphere, no wonder it attracts many foreign tourists and visitors – not much traffic on the road, with a charming town-like environment.

Many tourists are attracted to Dumaguete because of its accessibility to nearby natural wonders, beaches and dive sites. One such popular diving destination is Apo Island, one of the world’s best known marine sanctuaries (with over 600 documented fish species and 400 varieties of corals), which can be accessed by a 30-minute boat ride from the coastal town of Zamboangita, south of Dumaguete. The nearby town of Bais is also known for dolphin and whale watching, while tThe caves of Mabinay and the white sand bar in Tanjay are also popular tourist destinations.
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A virtual Visita Iglesia (church pilgrimage during the Holy Week)

The season of Lent is here again, and this means a week of reflection and meditation which starts from Holy Monday to Holy Tuesday, Holy Wednesday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Black Saturday and finally Easter Sunday. Whew.

There’s been a lot of traveling going on in the Philippines this Holy Week since most offices are closed on Thursday and Friday, a chance for the employed to travel to their hometowns and celebrate the Lenten Season with families, while some consider the free days as an opportunity to spend some quite and relaxing holiday in their favorite beaches or resorts. Thus, you can just imagine airports to be busy this week with fully-booked flights and jam-packed bus trips to provinces including inter island vessels and barges loaded with vehicles and passengers.

In relation to Maundy Thursday, most Filipinos observe the Visita Iglesia or church pilgrimage as part of the Holy Week celebration, where the Catholic faithful visit at least seven churches usually in the evening. In this entry, I will be sharing to you dear readers a virtual tour of some of the local and foreign churches and cathedrals I’ve been to from places in Europe and the Philippines. There are still lots of church photos in my archives, especially the St. Vitus Cathedral in Prague Castle, but I lack extra time to search for them.

Let’s start the virtual tour…

San Diego Pro-cathedral, Silay

Cebu Metropolitan Cathedral, Cebu (photo from flickr by coolmars)

Basilica Minore del Santo Niño, Cebu (photo from Wikipedia)

The shrine of the Infant Jesus at a side altar inside the Church of Our Lady Victorious, Prague

St. Nicholas Church at Old Town Square, Prague

Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul at Vysehrad Castle, Prague

Interior of the Cemetery Church of All Saints with an Ossuary also known as Church of Bones, Kutna Hora

Tyn Cathedral at the Old Town Square, Prague

St. Albert the Great Church (St. Albertus Magnus Kirche), our first stop during our Berlin day tour

St. Mary’s Church (Marienkirche), Berlin

St. Hedwig’s Cathedral, Berlin

Visita Iglesia is actually based on the ancient practice, possibly of Roman origins, of visiting seven pilgrim churches. In the Philippines, this tradition is not limited to only seven churches. I remember we used to practice Visita Iglesia in Cebu on foot since the churches are just within walking distance.

Here’s our usual route which I highly recommend if you’re planning to do Visita Iglesia in Cebu:
1. Start at San Nicolas Parish along Tupas St.
2. Santo Niño Parish in Pasil district
3. Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish (USJ-R), Magallanes St. (Carbon market district)
4. Basilica del Sto. Niño, Osmena Blvd.
5. Cebu Metropolitan Cathedral, P. Burgos St.
6. University of San Carlos chapel, P. del Rosario St.
7. and finally at Sto. Rosario Parish, P. del Rosario St.

The sidewalks of downtown Cebu are usually busy with people on the evening of Maundy Thursday. You would see parish-organized prayer communities, small groups, families or individuals walking along while singing religious songs, praying the Holy Rosary or the Stations of the Cross as they hike from one church to another. Here in Negros Occidental, the parishes are not so near each other, thus one has to commute or drive from one church to the next. Our usual Visita Iglesia route starts from the San Nicolas Parish in Talisay, then to Bata Subdivision, and other parishes in Bacolod.

The Flower Clock at the Rauma Museum

One of the featured art exhibits at the Rauma Museum in Finland during their Flower Power (Rauma Biennale Balticum 2008) art festival is the Flower Clock by artist Bjorn O. Olsson. The concept is based on the Flower Clock Phenomenon (Horologium Florae) which was according to the observations of Carl von Linne during the mid-18th century, wherein plants react to light as precisely as a clock ticks every second.
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United Buddy Bears in Berlin

I now know the story behind the colorful bear statue we saw in one of the sidewalks of Berlin which I just fondly named as the Berlin Bear. Well, that’s what you get with surfing in the net; you end up with some interesting information. The bear statue we saw is actually one of the United Buddy Bears.

A buddy bear (or friendship bear) is a painted sculpture made of fiberglass about two meters in height.

The buddy bears were displayed in previous art exhibitions in Berlin (2003 and 2006) and Warsaw (2008) with the motto: “We have to get to know each other better; it makes us understand one another better, trust each other more, and live together more peacefully.” The exhibition also went on global tour and was hosted in Hong Kong, Sydney, Tokyo, Warsaw and other cities.

The United Buddy Bears exhibition at Bebelplatz, Berlin-Mitte (Photo credits: Wikipedia)

The United Buddy Bears’ message is about the art of tolerance, to promote international understanding among different nations.

Art market in Berlin

Wanna shop for paintings, décors, jewelry, t-shirts, lanterns, bags, buttons and all sorts of art, handicrafts and books in Berlin? Check out the Art market (Kunstmarkt) at the Museum Island (Museumsinsel) beside the bridge every Saturday (11:00 AM – 3:00 PM) and Sunday (10:00 AM – 2:00 PM) where you can find some Berlin souvenirs to take home with you.

Here are some photos of what’s on sale at the street market where busy tourists crowd around the many items displayed.

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On local concerts and theater shows

One way for travel bugs to get a taste of a place’s art and culture is to watch the local concerts and musical events in town. I was not able to do so during my Prague vacation, but at least we were treated to a beautiful concert by the choir at the Strahovsky Monastery when we attended their 10am Sunday Mass. Well I still have some brochures here about upcoming concerts and shows in Prague, they’re just my souvenirs for now…maybe next time I’ll treat myself to a real Prague show.
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Home improvement ideas from travel

Our family had a nice day tour at the Royal Flora Festival in Chiang Mai, Thailand two years ago where we saw lots of great flower arrangement ideas for our home. Colorful plants and flowers were stacked on different levels of iron bars making a nice ‘flower column’ which is great for gardens with little space. Flowers were not planted directly on soil but on thin black plastic pots and grouped together to complement the other varieties. This makes it easier to replace with a new variety and planting these flowers on the pots gives more flexibility and creativity in your garden arrangement. The trip to the flower festival inspired us to spruce up our garden with the ideas we got from their presentation.
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Helsinki City Museum: Helsinki through the years

Continued from Helsinki City Museum: Old Helsinki days

At the second floor is the Russian era where more interesting artifacts are displayed. We took longer time at another section in the ground floor which highlights the era of Finnish independence from Russian rule, the consequent changes in Finnish lifestyle and the city’s progress that followed.

Museum caption in English: “Ration cards with cases and paper fabric purse from the 1940s. Food was rationed between 1939 and 1954.”

Museum caption in English: “Name tag and identity disc of child evacuee. 1939-45 more than 70,000 children evacuated from Finland to Sweden, Denmark and Norway.”

This is the top view of a miniature model of a clothing factory which I find so charming. The tiny dolls are busy seaming and working on equally tiny pieces of textile and sewing machines.

A huge poster of “I live in Helsinki” in many languages. Can you spot your own language here?

The multicultural environment in Helsinki is well summed up by these paragraphs posted in a nearby wall:

Who are we?

Helsinki is once again a multicultural city. In ten years refugees and immigrants have moved to Helsinki from all corners of the world. Today, there are 200 different mother tongues spoken in Helsinki. However, foreigners make up around just five per cent of the Helsinki population.

Finland joined the European Union in 1995. Despite geographical distance, Finland is closer to mainstream Europe. People and goods can move freely within EU Member States. The introduction of a common European currency brings us even closer to Europe.

Population growth in Helsinki has accelerated since the 1990s. The IT breakthrough has added to the attraction of the Helsinki region. In the midst of rapid change, people want to cling to something familiar and permanent. For example, there is a growing interest in Helsink slang. The Helsinki spirit of tomorrow is a blend of old and new.

The few hours spent going through the history of Helsinki as a city (and of Finland as a whole) left an impression of admiration, knowing that it went through hard and difficult times such as fire devastation, children being evacuated to nearby countries, food being rationed, and other turbulent events such as wars and diseases. It thrived through those trying times and developed to be one of Europe’s modern cities.

Helsinki City Museum: Old Helsinki days

While in Finland, my big sis took us on a day tour of Helsinki though our time was very much limited but nevertheless we squeezed in about an hour of visit at the Helsinki City Museum. We chose it from among the many museums listed on our guide since it was just within the city and dropping by is another way of learning more about the Helsinki’s history. I wanted so much to drop by the contemporary art museum but we really lack the time. Anyway, it was such an enjoyable one for us, we stayed longer than expected.

The museum has an ongoing exhibition titled “Helsinki Horizons” which features the history of the Finnish capital in pictures, paintings, artifacts and stories over the past 450 years. A lot of interesting items with explanations for each exhibit are printed in Finnish, Swedish and English. There were also cardboards with a list identifying each item, also in the three mentioned languages.

The museum entrance where behind the front doors, the visitors are greeted by a big screen with a film showing about the ongoing exhibition titled “Helsinki Horizons”.

At the ground floor were shown the Old Helsinki days during the Swedish era, with the scale models of ships and ancient tools used for fishing and livelihood, then the founding of Helsinki by King Gustav Vasa of Sweden, and the gradual progress of civilization.

Quick information about the Helsinki City Museum:

Location: Sofiankatu 4, Helsinki
Tel. +358 (0)9 310 36630
Cameras are allowed
Entrance is FREE
Exhibit captions in Finnish, Swedish and English
Opening hours: 9am – 5pm Monday to Friday
11am – 5pm Saturday & Sunday

Museum Shop (ground floor at the right side before the museum entrance)
Opening hours: 9am – 5pm Monday to Friday
11am – 5pm Saturday & Sunday

Picture Archives:
Customer service 10am – 3pm Mondays & Thursdays

To be continued

Prague artist David Cerny: pink tank, hanging statue, crawling babies and more

Would you paint a war tank pink? Maybe not, but controversial Czech artist and sculptor David Cerny did it to a Soviet tank when he was still an art student in 1991. While that tank is now kept in Lešany Military museum, a pink torso of a tank by Cerny was just recently planted on the grounds beside the Justicní Palác in Prague. The white stripe at the center is reminiscent of the invasion of the Soviet tanks in Czechoslovakia in 1968.

Call him weird, creative or what, incidentally he’s also the sculptor of the Viselec or the ‘Hanging Man’ at Jilska Street which I featured in my previous Wordless Wednesday post. The ‘Hanging Man’ is a life-size statue of famous psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud who was born in Moravia, Czech Republic. In 2007, the sculpture was part of art exhibitions held at the Open Concept Gallery in Grand Rapids, Michigan and the Columbia College in Chicago where it was installed high on top and caused alarm among the motorists who thought it was a real man about to take his own life. It has also made its appearance in other art exhibitions in Europe such as Berlin and Stockholm. Now that it’s back home, nobody seems to mind this hanging artwork when we were at the Old Town in Prague.

Another interesting work of Cerny is the crawling babies at the Prague Television Tower.

Photo credits: Prague TV Tower by rainydazeee.com

Wordless Wednesday: A building at the Old Town, Prague

To view more Wordless Wednesday entries, click here.

At the medieval Turku Castle

Visiting castles would always be on the travel itinerary of tourists when going to Europe. It’s like stepping into the days of kings and queens, or imagining you’re part of a fairy tale. Getting inside the medieval castle of Turku acquaints the visitor of Finland’s rich culture and history, each stair or doorway leading to more interesting rooms and displays.

The Renaissance castle exterior (or bailey) was constructed during the 15th to 16th centuries, while its main building (or keep) dates back to the early 14th century. The castle was subjected to some damage during World War II, but was gradually restored to its original grandeur through the years, afterwhich its ownership was entrusted to the Finnish state and presently managed by the City of Turku.
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Flower Power at the Rauma Art Museum

The Rauma Biennale Balticum 2008 art festival is currently ongoing at the Rauma Art Museum in Old Rauma, Finland. The exhibition, which started last June 14 and will end on September 21, features prominent Biennale artists such as Aija Zarina, Krista Leesi, Lutz Mommartz, Malgorzata Markiewicz and many others with this year’s theme ‘Flower Power’ which showcases a blend of contemporary art and tropical inspiration.
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Viennese coffee house culture

Meeting in cafés have become part of the Viennese culture, where prominent writers used to be seen together exchanging ideas with contemporaries and some even find it a comfortable place to write their thoughts, thus the terms ‘coffee house literature’ and ‘coffee house poets’. Coffee is one beverage most people consume to stimulate their minds.
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Panaad Festival in Negros 2008

What’s up in Negros Occidental? It’s a week-long event that’s not to be missed by the Negrosanons, the Panaad Festival which is dubbed as the “mother of all festivals”. This annual event showcases the arts and culture, tourist attractions and local products of the different towns and municipalities in the province of Negros Occidental, from faraway places such as Kabankalan, Himamaylan, Toboso and Calatrava to nearby cities Talisay and Bacolod.

Held at the Panaad Park and Stadium, this festival just started last Saturday April 26 and will end on May 3. This year’s highlight is the special tribute to the late Gov. Joseph Maranon and the SMART PBA All-Star games held at the West Negros College.

Note: Above images were taken April 2006 and featured in my other blog ideasnpink’s Tatak Negros (Proudly Negros Made). This year’s Panaad Festival photo from happysteps? Not yet…I will be posting soon after our visit there within this week. Stay tuned.

Update: We haven’t gone to the Panaad Festival as expected because of our hectic schedule. sigh.