Pasigarbo draws more towns

This year’s  Pasigarbo sa Sugbo festival drew more participants and better performances from Cebu’s towns, Capitol officials said last night.

“I know the dancers and the choreographers dug deep to find the artist in them really burning inside. We are seeing more of them assisting, not one but a whole fleet working together to make their festival outstanding,” siad Vice Gov. Agnes Magpale in a speech opening the event at the  Cebu International Convention Center (CICC) in Mandaue.

She said the “Festival of Festivals”   drew 40 contingents, up from 32 last year.

Dance troupes from different towns and cities of Cebu performed on the street, vying for a P1 million cash prize for the best delegation as thousands of spectators filed the CICC parking lot.

Guests  officials from South Cotabato, Ilocos Norte and Albay provinces watched with them.

The crowd roared its approval for the first performance of the evening, Aloguinsan town’s “Kinsan Festival.”

Sibonga town, with its Bonga Festival,  hopes to  clinch the festival championship after placing second last year. Bonga is  Cebuano for fruit.

Bantayan town spent P2 million for its dance contingent to enact their Palawod Festival , showing their seaside life with houses on stilts.

Magpale said she saw  big improvements in the presentations of the towns, whose dancers rehearsed nearly daily at the CICC parking lot where a big stage was mounted.

Still, Cebu Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia challenged the towns to continue “raising the bar.

The Pasigarbo Festival Queens will be presented tonight at the convention center. Contest winners will be  recognized in a program tomorrow at the CICC.

All roads that led to the CICC event site drew heavy traffic in major thoroughfares in Mandaue City.

Traffice was rerouted in anticipation of the congestion.

Despite the heavy traffic, Insp. Luis Alama of the Mandaue City Police Office’s traffic division, said there was no untoward incident. With Correspondent Norman V. Mendoza