I first heard about Jesse Robredo in 1990 through the news but it was different when I went to Naga (it was not a city yet) to attend a national conference on local history at the Ateneo de Naga in October 1990. I joined the group of history professors from UP Diliman and UP Baguio. We arrived the day before and stayed in a pension house in the heart of Naga because the accommodation for delegates was quite far from the conference venue. Early morning of the first day, we found a perfect place to stay, a dormitory run by nuns with vacant rooms since students went home during the conference days. This was right in front of the conference venue. The three-day conference was well organized. Every end of the day, delegates had the chance to go around the town which was so clean with trees abounding the roadsides.
I remember our visit to the Naga museum, how our guide a conference delegate was so proud telling us about the town mayor who worked hard to make Naga prosper. Tricycle drivers were very courteous and helpful. Visitors felt safe going around the town. Jesse Robredo was a household name. The third day of the conference was a trip to Naga’s historical sites. I will never forget our visit to a beautiful cave where we could view Mt. Mayon from different angles. When I came back I shared with some of my students my beautiful experience especially when some of them were scheduled to participate in a press conference for high school students in Naga two months after.
After the press conference, one of the student delegates shared his experience in Naga and thanked me for briefing him earlier. He could not join the group in their flight to Naga because he was late. He took another flight via Manila. When he arrived, the tricycle drivers were so helpful and honest that he rejoined his group feeling good.
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Last week, I went to Carcar City to visit a classmate. When I passed by barangay Tinaan, Naga City, I was horrified to see the trunks of three giant trees lying at the roadside beside the widening site in the vicinity of a cement factory. The area suddenly turned into a mini desert. I pity the residents who already suffer from the exhaust of the cement factory. Now they have to bear the scorching heat of the sun. When I reached Perrelos in Carcar, I foresaw a mini desert where some of the heritage acacia trees would be cut down for the widening of the national road. When I was a child, everytime I passed by Perrrelos on the way to Cebu city, we all stood up in the bus to view the canopy of acacia trees. Before the array of acacia trees was the series of fire trees on both sides before and after the bridge. It was part of the delight we felt everytime we went to and from the city.
There is an alternative road near the sea but I think whoever decided on the road widening was only looking at the sides of the road. Such narrowmindedness. When I reached the Poblacion, another nightmare greeted me. The ricefields are diminishing to give way to several structures, residences and commercial buildings and two diversion roads, one leading to Sibonga in the south and another to Barili in the southwest. At least the diversion roads did not destroy the whole aesthetic view of the vast ricefields. As a child , when I went to the city or the south, I knew I was entering or leaving Carcar because of the vast ricefields.
There is more than enough destruction and eventual extinction of Carcar’s natural and built heritages not to mention the extreme problem of drug abuse and peace and order. What is so scary is that there is no effort at all on the part of the local government to do something about it. We are all awaiting for the advent of a Jesse Robredo in Carcar. With the elections in 2013, voters should also include in their checklist whether the candidates have done something about the people’s heritage.
The mountain barangays of Carcar are becoming a very attractive site for recollections or retreats, training, workshop or just sightseeing. I join the monthly Hillyland Tour of the cluster of families of the Pinanggang Sugbuanong Banay and I find it so refreshing (de-stressing is the best word) going to the Zipline, planting trees on designated places, having a sumptuous lunch at CREMDEC in Taptap, and buying and harvesting vegetables and ornamental plants along the way. You never miss the flowers and the sweet corn, cooked and cooked.
The roads are well paved so you feel safe. Just recently I joined LAW Center Inc.’s planning workshop in Racho Cancio, a beautiful resort on the slopes of barangay Adlaon overlooking the city and Mactan Island, with a beautifully furnished Japanese-inspired house and landscape with a swimming pool. We reached the place by renting the barangay bus that fetched us the next day. There is so much to explore and extend our advocacies in the mountain barangays.