Baguio In Bloom

PANAGBENGA is Baguio City’s equivalent of a town fiesta. For a few days in February, the city is thrown into minor chaos as hordes of people flock to the city center to watch the street dancing or view the floral parade.

The main thoroughfare, Session Road, is closed for a few days and cafes are allowed to spill over on the street. There is an air of unperturbed cheerfulness, with many of the locals socializing till dawn, oblivious to the fact that they may have to go to work in a few hours. After all, it is a legitimate excuse to unwind with friends and rediscover the camaraderie of the "good old days."

Now on its sixth year, the Panagbenga Flower Festival has attracted an unprecedented number of participants since its inception. Delegations from Baguio schools and establishments were joined by groups from as far south as the NCR and Southern Luzon. As early as 10 a.m., participants to the street dancing converged at the Baguio Convention Center. The parade promptly began at 2 p.m., snaking through the city’s main arteries of Session Road and Harrison Road, with everyone converging at Burnham Park’s Football Field at about 6:30 p.m., more than four hours after it started. For the Baguio resident, this is really quite strange since a walk though the same route on an ordinary busy day would take no more than 20 minutes. The day’s program ended with a laser show sponsored by SMART Telecommunications, whose presence was very apparent in the festivities.

A market encounter at Club John Hay’s Scout Hill gives an opportunity for local businessmen to sell their products. Formally opened on Sunday, the fair is ongoing for the duration of the flower festival. Aside from the usual plants and garden supplies and paraphernalia, souvenir items, such as silver jewelry and other floral-inspired knick-knacks available. Of course, there is no saying what surprises the intrepid shopper may discover.

An added bonus is the landscaping exhibit and competition that has always been a much- awaited attraction of the festival, especially for the camera-wielding, barrier-breaching photography hounds.

A word of advice, though: It is always a nice walk through John Hay. Something definitely happened (this is an understatement) when they decided that John Hay would be "much nicer" if some of the original roads inside the camp were eliminated. For those adventurous souls who want to see some really upsetting ghosts in the daytime, a walk through John Hay’s Lost Cemetery is highly recommended. Nevertheless, the faint scent of petunias in bloom at the Bell Amphitheater would console those who may feel some nostalgia for the old John Hay.

Panagbenga is a Kankanaey term that means "a time of blossoming," and indeed, February is an appropriate time to hold a "Flower Festival." It is a time when many flowers bloom. Aside from the wild sunflowers that carpet the mountainsides with a bright shade of yellow, the parachute-shaped lavender flowers of the morning glory can be espied as one drives through the city streets. The more observant individual may find the white and pink trumpet flowers growing on little side streets, or thickets of wild Queen Anne’s lace that are better left alone, as they wilt shortly after they are picked. There is also an occasional early-blooming jacaranda tree with its dark violet blossoms.

Of course, the city’s gardeners have been hard at work, too. Their efforts are rewarded by a myriad of blooms in the various public parks. There are multi-hued roses, dahlias and chrysanthemums, fat powder puffs of marigold, delicate petunias and regal hollyhocks. A visit to the Orchidarium at the west side of Burnham Park is always a treat for plant lovers, with varicolored cymbidiums and healthy specimens of the caped Medenilla Magnifica being offered for sale. There are also the imported varieties of azalea, geranium, tulip and cyclamen that cannot survive the lowland heat. Boaters at Burnham Lake may receive a pleasant sprinkling of water from the lake’s fountain, which has been resurrected after decades of dormancy.

The opening ceremonies of this year’s Flower Festival attracted an unprecedented number of visitors to Baguio City. The gridlock was almost unbearable, and, clearly, the city streets were not meant for huge volumes of traffic. This was aggravated by buses parked on both sides of the roads, and siren-blowing flashy cars that counter-flowed with impunity. It didn’t help that various road projects were not completed on time. The weather, however, was very cooperative and more conducive to taking a nice, leisurely stroll rather than stewing inside an automobile.

Understandably, there was a human gridlock alongside the parade route. A Caucasian guest remarked, after squeezing through a human churn, "I just made 500 new friends back there!" The same friend rather perceptively noted how the children who were in the parade had no smiles by the end of the day. "This is a festival, right?" she noted. "So why does it look like the children were forced? I haven’t seen a smiling kid yet."

A walk through Baguio after the crowd dispersed revealed mounds of garbage and crushed plants, casualties in the mad scramble for prime space – a sorry sight in a season of supposed blossoming.

But street sweepers quickly went to work to remedy the wreckage. Still clad in their parade garb, weary children on their way home cheerfully posed with tourists. City residents gamely left their vehicles at home and walked or took whatever public transport was available to get to where they had to go.

And like the dandelions that burst through the cracks in the concrete, or the lavender clover flowers that bloom in the most inconspicuous spots, or the wild impatiens that render spots of color amidst dreary landscapes, the simple and hardy Baguio folk are ultimately the finest blooms in the flower festival.