Dorang Gala goes to Balayong Festival in Puerto Princesa!

cherry blossom festival

My most awaited trip has come.. our Puerto Princesa-El Nido trip! Last thursday we arrived in Puerto Princesa at 12nn. We have til 6pm to roam in the city while waiting for our friend's arrival. We decided to eat our lunch first then after we just walked around the city, when we saw some colorful floats and people in costumes just beside the road. We asked someone what is happening and they told us that they we're celebrating Balayong Festival. My curiosity kicks in what is Balayong about, so I asked what is Balayong and they told us that it is cherry blossom festival and pointing the trees with pink flowers blooming.

balayong festival 2011

The festival commemorates the founding anniversary of Puerto Princesa highlighted by street dancing, marching bands, parade and colorful floats made of recyclable materials.  I was surprised that we have cherry blossoms here in our country, thought that it only exists in Japan.  We're so lucky to experience such a colorful festival and grab the opportunity to pose and to take some pictures with the floats.

with the marching band

We felt a real tourists posing with the marching bands and in front of every barangay participants with their banners and posters. (Parang muse lang!)

wacky pose with the ati-atihan

Palawenos are very friendly and approachable. I had so much fun posing with the ati-atihan guys while they were shouting "wacky! wacky!" and did funny poses. Most of Palawenos were speaking Tagalog, there are a little amount of people using their native dialect known as "kuyonon" which they say a combination of Spanish-Bisaya.

sheng and cha with the colorful float

feeling muse

the airsoft team

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The festival was celebrated for 4 days, March 3-6.  There's also a show that was held in the coliseum, and Arnel Pineda perfor,med in the said show. We weren't able to catch it because that night we were heading to El Nido, but we met Arnel during our Underground River tour which I'll gonna post soon.

posted in wordpress: 03.10.11