Agal-Agal Festival: A Vibrant Celebration of Tawi-Tawi’s Culture

Marky Ramone Go December 17, 2017

As I stood on the deck of BRP Capones—a spanking new Japanese-made Parola-class patrol vessel of the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG)—where we hitched a ride going to Tawi-Tawi to cover the Agal-Agal Festival, I quickly surveyed my surroundings. I saw the sacred mountain of Bud Bongao lording it over a picturesque landscape and covered by the morning mist. Yet, I was able to spot the silhouette of the town’s Mosque and the outlines of a modest village with fishing boats and passenger ferries that are starting to stir the day’s activities. And then it dawned on me, I finally reached the southernmost province of the country. Tawi-Tawi, I have arrived!

a woman participates in the agal agal festival

Agal-Agal Festival also celebrates the seaweed cultivation practice in the region

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Discovering a Trove of Cultural and Historical Relics at Villa Escudero

Marky Ramone Go December 07, 2017

“There’s only one country I haven’t been to. Nepal. I don’t know why – I just haven’t had the chance” – Don Ado told us after he overheard me asking my friend Karla “Can you guess how many countries he had traveled to?.” It wasn’t a question concocted out of the blue. I wondered about it after surveying through the massive art, historic, religious and souvenir collection housed inside Don Ado’s private mansion.

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Photo-Shooting Pretties at the National Museum of Fine Arts

Marky Ramone Go December 02, 2017

Housing painting and sculpture masterpieces by world-renowned Filipino artists such as Juan Luna, Guillermo Tolentino and Felix Resurreccion Hidalgo, the National Museum of Fine Arts dishes plenty of eye candy from its every square inch. Kept in this neoclassical building first built in 1921, are an abundance of historical artworks that rivals even some of the biggest museums and galleries around the world.