Pahiyas Festival

The Pahiyas Festival in Lucban, Quezon Province is without a doubt the most beautiful fiesta I have been to in the Philippines. I went there with my fellow Tagalog students and a couple of our teachers. It was a lovely drive through the mountains despite the early morning start. After a few unexpected detours (No we weren’t lost, just geographically embarrassed), we arrived in Lucban. Finding parking was crazy. We had to drive down tiny little alleys lined with cars and people until we could eventually find somewhere to park on the outskirts of town. Then we walked into the middle of town where people had decorated their houses with food, flowers and anything else you could possible imagine. It was an amazing site, truly spectacular! The people were so imaginative. They have this competition every year where you can text the number of your favourite house to a service provider who tallies the votes and at the end of the day a winner is announced. A really cool idea. They’ve also got a special dish called “hab-hab” which is noodles in a banana leaf you eat with your mouth. Oops, that must sound funny. You don’t use cutlery or your hands, you just open your mouth and eat it straight off the banana leaf. Man was it tasty and cheap. I think it was 10 pesos (about 25 cents) per serve. I think I had 3 servings! Yummm… The other thing about this place that struck me was that it was old. There was church that was built in 1595. It’s the oldest building I have ever seen! But my favourite part of the whole day was a guy in body paint who danced to the beat of funky music all day. I just had to get a photo with him. It was so funny. Every time language or life got me down for the next couple of weeks I just thought of the dancing dude and a broad smile crept across my face. It’s happening right now.