Rising from Yolanda: Tacloban revives Sangyaw Festival

Jazmin Bonifacio

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Rising from Yolanda: Tacloban revives Sangyaw Festival
'We want our tourism back. We want to celebrate life with our learnings after Yolanda,' says Councilor Cristina Romualdez of the month-long activities that start May 31

TACLOBAN CITY, Philippines – More than a year after Tacloban was devastated by Super Typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan), the local government attempts to revive the city’s tourism potential by bringing back the Sangyaw Festival.

Tacloban City Councilor Cristina Gonzalez-Romualdez, who chairs the tourism committee, said the people’s resiliency will be the theme of the grand festival that had traditionally been the highlight of the city fiesta.

Month-long acivities will start on May 31 through a Grand Santa Cruzan. The city fiesta is on June 30. Other activities include the Search for Miss Tacloban, Parade of Lights, and Sangyaw Awards for outstanding individuals and groups in the city.

During that month, a “Resilience Summit” will be held, with local government officials and academics from around Eastern Visayas participating.

The councilor said the Sangyaw Festival will “showcase to the world that Tacloban is beautiful and progressive” despite what had happend during Yolanda, the world’s strongest typhoon, which claimed more than 6,000 lives mostly in Tacloban in November 2013.

The city government is reducing to half the P6 million originally proposed budget for the month-long activities, which is already lower than what it spent in 2012 and 2013. They skipped the celebrations in 2014, months after the killer typhoon.

“It will be a low-key celebration – simple but beautiful and with social relevance. We want our tourism back. We want our Sangyaw to be bigger, brighter, and we want to  celebrate life with our experiences and learnings after Yolanda,” Councilor Romualdez said.

Tacloban is targeting over a million visitors this year’s city fiesta. Top personalities and political leaders are also expected to grace the event. – Rappler.com 

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