Wanted: Cultural Champions

I recently spent some time in Cebu with my family. As a tourist attraction, it hadn't received the hype often lavished on choice tourist locations like Boracay, Palawan or, more recently Bohol, but it did boast the most development of any province outside of Manila.

Now I won't argue with the numbers that Cebu's denizens have proudly posted for the public at large; I won't argue that they're earning more as a province than any other, or that their development is at this stage or that, but I will say that whatever it is they're earning, they sure as hell aren't spending it beautifying their city.

I came to Cebu eager to see things like their cathedral and the legendary Magellan's cross, only to be profoundly disappointed by both. Magellan's cross in particular was a real let down; from the pictures I was inexplicably so certain that I would find the thing atop a hill or surrounded by something like a lavishly landscaped garden. Imagine how I felt when I found it sitting in the middle of some stinking (literally) square in front of Cebu City Hall. After the disappointment that the cathedral turned out to be, I had been buoyed by the well-maintained, sumptuously decorated Basilica de Santo Nino, and expected the romanticized vision of the cross that the pictures had inspired in my imagination.

So are we to understand that, for all this progress and money, the provincial government doesn't even see fit to preserve some of its greatest historical treasures?

I hope that's not the case.

Cebu could, with all of the richness of its history, definitely use its own version of the Intramuros administration, or even its own Carlos Celdran.

I love what Celdran has done for old Manila. I went on one of his tours in 2002 and was delighted to see how much ink he's gotten over the years; he seems to have become a fixture in the tourist scene. Here's a guy who, as far as I can tell, has literally made a living doing his own thing, and living out his obvious passion for the Philippines' oldest city.

My wife and I aren't exactly cultural slouches; aside from our shared love for Intramuros, we went on, like I said, Celdran's tour of the Escolta area in 2002, and did the rounds in the Ilocos, visiting nearly a dozen old churches from Vigan to Pagudpud (that's a lot of wishes, if you believe the superstitions about stepping into churches for the first time) and we made it a point to get a map of Cebu so we would know where to go for the sights and sounds beyond the local mall. We know that Cebu has just as much history behind it as Manila, and yet the only things that were even vaguely attractive about it to us were SM and the Ayala Mall.

To my mind, and I am loath to say this, it seems that this is because the people responsible for the upkeep of the city and its cultural monuments don't really seem to give a shit.

Cebuanos who should stumble on this may want to pillory me, but like I said, I don't dispute the numbers or the claims to prosperity; I only call it like I see it.

As the starting point of the Philippines' colonization by Spain, among other things, Cebu has a lot to attract people besides freaking Plantation Bay, and I think it's really sad that the local government hasn't thought to make the most out of it.