The fast rising popularity of the city based festivity dubbed as “Saulog, Tagbilaran” will kick off this year’s episode on Wednesday with the nighty presentation which comes simultaneous with the nine-day Novena Mass at the St. Joseph Cathedral.

Mayor John Gessnell “Baba” Yap  is making double time efforts in his tourism drive said the festivity will drum beat the city’s active involvement in Bohol’s eco-cultural thrust as main highlights include the city version of Saulog Street Dancing on Sunday, a fluvial procession, Saulog in Concert, and the much awaited Mutya sa Tagbilaran coronation night on  Friday at the Bohol Wisdom School. (See: complete activities schedule on p. 16)

Mayor Yap said the events will hype the observance of the City Fiesta on May 1 in honor of its patron saint, St. Joseph (The Worker).
The “Baba Yap Got Talent will be on held on May 1 at the City Square while the open basketball tourney opens on May 2.a

Meanwhile, a merrier and bigger madre gras is expected on Sunday’s Saulog Street Dancing

This as 15 of the 15 city districts fielding dancing contingents in the street dancing and ritual competition are now given P200,000.00 as cash subsidy for the record to beat: most widely participated street-dancing event in the city.

Choreographers from distant regions and instrumentalists are having a field day and nights as district contingents even close their rehearsals to the public to really show something that would enthrall the crowd, she shared.

She said organizers may not be able to strip off the usual dance steps alien to Bohol culture, but Gabin, who used to be a dancer from the famed Bohol High School Bukangliwayway Troupe added that dancing contingents must show at least four basic dance steps which are among the judging criteria: panguros, panukdok, pagpanipilya and paghalad.

These are the most basic tasks of the saint worker upon which the city is enthroned.

Poised to aggressively push for tourism by making the city, not just as entry and exit point for Bohol tourists, Tagbilaran presents the City of Friendship as a veritable tourism destination in itself. according to city information officer Fiel Gabin during the weekly “Kapihan sa PIA.”

The Saulog streetdancing, apart from being a dance offering of the life of Saint Joseph, also allows Tagbilaranons to showcase what the City of Friendship has to offer.

Also to watch during the streetdancing event are the Festival Queens, the most fitting epitomes of Tagbilaran as a city of grace, color and character.

And for another first, the competition would be claiming the city streets and main thoroughfare; not on the usual vesper day of the feastday of the city’s patron Saint Joseph the Worker, but on Sunday, April 26. (with reports from Rey T./PIA-7Bohol)