A parade and dance competition is to be held on the streets of Taipei on Sunday to mark Santo Nino, an annual celebration of the Philippines’ Catholic history, the Manila Economic and Cultural Office said on Wednesday.
Usually held on the third Sunday in January, Santo Nino is celebrated in commemoration of Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan in 1521 bringing a statue of the baby Jesus as a baptismal gift to Hara Amihan, the wife of the ruler of the the Rajahnate of Cebu in what is now the central Philippines.
For this year’s holiday, the office and the Taipei City Government have coorganized the event under the banner “Santo Nino Beats for Peace Festival: In My Circular World,” which is to showcase Philippine religious traditions and culture, the office said in a statement.
The gift of the Jesus statue is one of the most important events in the religious history of the Philippines, as it paved the way for the spread of Christianity in the country, it added.
Fourteen groups are to take part in the event, which would start with a parade at 1:30pm from St Christopher’s Church on Zhongshan N Road, the office said.
The parade would then head toward Linsen N Road, Nongan Street and then back to Zhongshan N Road, before assembling at 4pm at the Taipei Expo Park for an awards ceremony, it said.
The event would be the biggest Philippine culture-related parade and street dance event since the Taipei Masskara Festival in September 2020, in which about 1,200 people took part.
Known as the “Festival of Smiles,” Masskara has become one of the Philippines’ most celebrated and colorful events since it was first held in Bacolod in the 1980s.
As of the end of last year, there were 141,808 Philippine migrant workers in Taiwan, making them the third-largest group of migrant workers in the nation after Indonesians and Vietnamese, Ministry of Labor data showed.
For more information on Sunday’s event, visit the Manila Economic and Cultural Office’s Facebook page.
AGING: While Japan has 22 submarines, Taiwan only operates four, two of which were commissioned by the US in 1945 and 1946, and transferred to Taiwan in 1973 Taiwan would need at least 12 submarines to reach modern fleet capabilities, CSBC Corp, Taiwan chairman Chen Cheng-hung (陳政宏) said in an interview broadcast on Friday, citing a US assessment. CSBC is testing the nation’s first indigenous defense submarine, the Hai Kun (海鯤, Narwhal), which is scheduled to be delivered to the navy next month or in July. The Hai Kun has completed torpedo-firing tests and is scheduled to undergo overnight sea trials, Chen said on an SET TV military affairs program. Taiwan would require at least 12 submarines to establish a modern submarine force after assessing the nation’s operational environment and defense
A white king snake that frightened passengers and caused a stir on a Taipei MRT train on Friday evening has been claimed by its owner, who would be fined, Taipei Rapid Transit Corp (TRTC) said yesterday. A person on Threads posted that he thought he was lucky to find an empty row of seats on Friday after boarding a train on the Bannan (Blue) Line, only to spot a white snake with black stripes after sitting down. Startled, he jumped up, he wrote, describing the encounter as “terrifying.” “Taipei’s rat control plan: Release snakes on the metro,” one person wrote in reply, referring
The coast guard today said that it had disrupted "illegal" operations by a Chinese research ship in waters close to the nation and driven it away, part of what Taipei sees a provocative pattern of China's stepped up maritime activities. The coast guard said that it on Thursday last week detected the Chinese ship Tongji (同濟號), which was commissioned only last year, 29 nautical miles (54km) southeast of the southern tip of Taiwan, although just outside restricted waters. The ship was observed lowering ropes into the water, suspected to be the deployment of scientific instruments for "illegal" survey operations, and the coast
An inauguration ceremony was held yesterday for the Danjiang Bridge, the world’s longest single-mast asymmetric cable-stayed bridge, ahead of its official opening to traffic on Tuesday, marking a major milestone after nearly three decades of planning and construction. At the ceremony in New Taipei City attended by President William Lai (賴清德), Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰), Minister of Transportation and Communications Chen Shih-kai (陳世凱) and New Taipei City Mayor Hou Yu-ih (侯友宜), the bridge was hailed as both an engineering landmark and a long-awaited regional transport link connecting Tamsui (淡水) and Bali (八里)
RSS