CeBu CeBoom CeBlog

Sun.Star Cebu - Cabaero: Complementary development

METRO Cebu is one of the fastest growing areas in the country. As the cities that comprise the metropolitan area grow in population, infrastructure and economic activity, the pressure on their local leaders expands as well.

The demand for more roads, schools, hospitals and other vital infrastructure will continue, except that in a bustling metropolis there would be a need to make these development plans comprehensive and complementary.

Swedish Ambassador makes presentation at cebu City Sports Club in the forum on “Philippine Sweden business Opportunity.

Swede diplomat urges tourism ties with RP - INQ7.net

SWEDEN’s ambassador to the Philippines Annika Markovic is urging the country’s tourism sector to tie up with travel agencies in her country to attract high-spending Swede tourists.

The Swedes, she said, are a potentially huge tourist market for the Philippines.

“We really enjoy traveling and Swedes really make plans in traveling and going abroad,” Markovic yesterday told reporters.

Markovic and other officials of the Swedish Embassy yesterday conducted a forum on “Philippine Sweden Business Opportunity” at the Cebu City Sports Club.

Osmeña: Brace for heavy traffic during ASEAN Summit - INQ7.net

One of the most frequently asked questions of the riding public, including businessmen who lobbied against the holiday, is what exact time road blocks would be set up, and how employees can get to work with the massive rerouting.

Volunteers told: Be patient in assisting journalists - INQ7.net

THE 150 STUDENT media volunteers who were tasked to assist foreign journalists covering the 12th Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit were given one important advise: Don’t complain.

Press Undersecretary Roberto Capco said “less talk so that you’ll commit less mistakes in assisting journalists.”

He urged the student volunteers to be patient in assisting irate journalists.

For the last 2 years, we have added various websites.

There are wikis (  The CebuWiki is a wiki we did to promote our city),  and galleries ( Cebu Pictures Gallery hosts pictures about Cebu , and the Premium Concepts - my wife’s lifestyle store chain).

There are also various blogs.  Ng KHai  computer blog, The Business Driven life and Cebu Ceboom Ceblog, and  various tech support forums.

Many responded that they are having a hard time keeping up with many sites, and the last few days, we have put in a portal which automatically summarizes what is happening in all these sites. We have also put in many of the summaries ( RSS summary feeds) of some of the great management and technical blogs that we want everybody to  read.

You can access it all here.

Independent films crafted by Filipinos are
getting the recognition they deserve in competitions abroad. Just
recently the movie “Donsol” won the Special Jury Prize in the 2nd Asian
Marine International Festival in Chiba City, Japan.

“Donsol” had been invited to join the competition. Director
Adolf Alix, executive producer Ricky Gallardo and the film’s stars Sid
Lucero and Angel Aquino flew to Chiba without much fanfare.

Angel made heads turn around with her looks and Sid also
merited not a few glances among the delegates. Angel in fact got a
special citation from the jury for her portrayal of a breast-cancer
survivor who fell in love with someone younger than she is. The prize
elated Direk Adolf;  More …

Today, standing beside a Cebu City fire department station is a simple cross. It is all that remained of one of the richest churches in the 19th century Philippines.

Destroyed not by war or natural disaster, the exquisite Parian parish church was demolished in an act of vengeance aimed directly at Cebu’s powerful Chinese mestizo community.

In 1849, after two decades of conflict, the Spanish governor general ordered the suppression of the Parian parish and the destruction of its church.

Thirty years later the Spanish bishop of Cebu carried out that order and the church was disassembled stone by stone-a unique event in Philippine ecclesiastical history and, perhaps, even in the history of Christendom.

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One morning, I was awaken by the ear-splitting sounds of drum beats near my house. It really got on my nerves I couldn’t help but cursed in silence. I hate to wake up as early as 4 o’clock but my curiosity got the best of me. I dragged myself to the nearest window and took a peek. I saw a lot of people in the street. Although still sleepy, I went downstairs and headed for the door outside to get a closer look. I later learned that every 2nd Saturday of January the procession bearing the image of Sto Niño will pass by our rented house to Ouano wharf where it will be brought back, via a fluvial parade, to the Basilica del Sto Niñoin Cebu City. It was not just a simple ceremony or a ritual, but a significant event that shows the deeper meaning of the coming of the Sto. Nino to Cebuto complete the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph”.

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We, Filipino men, seem to have a talent in pleasing our other halves, be it legal or otherwise, to the nth degree for added panache in our copulation rituals. Pleasing our partners anyway we can has become a way of Filipino macho man’s life.

A few weeks ago as I wandered around the downtown, I stumbled upon a bespectacled little elderly man with streaks of gray hair on his head sitting on a low stool by the sidewalk. It was a leisurely stroll on a lazy Saturday afternoon along Osmena Blvd. some two blocks off from Basilica del Sto. Nino when I noticed this man tending to his wares displayed conspicuously in what seemed to be like an open wooden attache case placed upon a high stool.

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I should have written this article long before I should write anything else to this blog. I’ve been contributing to this blog because a friend told me so. Not because I am obliged to do so but because I love to write too.

I hesitated at first because I know I’m not that really good in grammar and syntax of the English language which are required of a good writing. But he reassured me not to worry much on that department because he would edit it anyway before it is finally published.

I come from the land down under. No, not Australia. I come from Mindanao, the supposed ‘Land of Promise’ which is now an extinct monicker to a land long considered in the past as the land of plenty where homesteading was still widely practice. I don’t know if non-Mindanaoans would still consider Mindanao the ‘Land of Promise’. But here I am, uprooted from the land of plenty.

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Leonilo Estimo is one of the distinguished artists Cebu has ever known in recent memory. He is a multi-talented and a multi-awarded artist who helps the advancement of Cebuano literature in the country, having been recognized by some of the country’s prestigious institutions such as the Cultural Center of the Philippines, Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Award for Literature, Cebu Arts Foundation, Ludabi Inc. and Bathalad Inc.

He is a poet, drama writer, novelist, short story writer, and academician. Come January 23, 2006, the Southwestern University (SWU) will pay him a tribute during the launching of his book, Suhot.

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