Sinulog Festival | Cebu
Celebration
The Holy Child Festival is a very grand event in Cebu. It is one of the most attended festivals in the Philippines, attracting millions of locals and tourists from all over the world. Although the Holy Child Festival is scheduled on the third weekend of January, the entire celebration will last for more than a week. Locals will hold the Holy Child statue on the street and dance the unique Holy Child wave dance with "one step back, two steps forward". The parade can be several kilometers long and full of joy.
The parade that day gathered in Cebu and surrounding cities. During the day, there were drum bands, gorgeous parade floats, various street dances, and large puppets of all shapes and sizes occupying the streets. At night, there were fireworks shows and carnival parties. The celebration lasted all day, with strong ethnic colors, lively and no dull moments. The city of Cebu controlled important traffic arteries for the parade to celebrate. The rumbling drums guided the dancing team to march, forming a human dragon team like a flowing river (Sulog in Philippine), which explains the origin of the name SINULOG, the local language of Cebu.
The Cebu El Niño Festival originated in 1521, when Ferdinand Magellan (c.1480-1521) led the Spanish fleet to dock in Cebu, declared the place a Spanish territory, and guided the King of Cebu (Rajah Humabon), Queen (Amihan) and the people to believe in Catholicism. The King and Queen were baptized and renamed Carlo and Juana respectively. After Magellan's death, Cebu incorporated the local traditional rituals of beast worship into Catholic festivals, forming the original prototype of the local El Niño Festival.
The traditional dance of Cebu is the highlight of the festival. Through the form of dance drama, the history of the Spanish colonists presenting the statue of the Holy Child to the Queen is interpreted, and the dancer who plays Queen Juana holds the statue of the Holy Child (pictured below) to drive away demons and evil spirits from all sides, blessing the people with peace and health.