Politicians Join Sinulog Festival

One of the initiatives that the city has undertaken to promote last year's out-of-town contingents is to publish pictures of their festival queens in this month's issue of Philippine Airlines' Mabuhay Magazine. Osmeña said the city spent P50,000 for the photographer that took the studio pictures of the festival queens.

Aside from this, the city has also produced calendars that feature pictures of the festival queens and the sceneries and historical backgrounds of their places.

Meanwhile, the Metro Cebu Water District yesterday announced it will once again provide free drinking water to the Sinulog revelers during the Grand Mardi Gras parade on Sunday.

The Sinulog festival is one of the grandest and most colorful festivals in the Philippines. The main festival is held each year on the third Sunday of January in Cebu City to honor the Santo Niño, or the child Jesus, who used to be the patron saint of the whole province of Cebu (since in the Catholic faith Jesus is not a saint, but God). It is essentially a dance ritual which remembers the Filipino people's pagan past and their acceptance of Christianity.

The festival features some the country's most colorful displays of pomp and pageantry: participants garbed in bright-colored costumes dance to the rhythm of drums, trumpets, and native gongs. The streets are usually lined with vendors and pedestrians all wanting to witness the street-dancing. Smaller versions of the festival are also held in various parts of the province, also to celebrate and honor the Santo Niño. There is also a Sinulog sa Kabataan, which is performed by the youths of Cebu a week before the Grand Parade.