The author, critic and academician, Dennis B. Gonzaga, wrote a series of 28 short features on various creative, cultural, and heritage elements around the city of Naga. These were featured on his The 416 Art Space FB page and the Rigmat Arts and Culture Fest FB page — everything about museums, visual artists, comfort food, hidden cultural gems in the backstreets, unsung personalities, urban streetscapes and trends, public markets, sacred spaces, and many more about this vibrant, colorful and happy city. This is Part 1 of a series of 4, featuring Days 1 to 7.

February 1: Museo ni Jesse Robredo

Nestled cozily in a grove of shade trees–something of a rarity in the city nowadays—is the iconic Museo ni Jesse Robredo. This museum was built, completed, and opened in 2017 in commemoration of the fifth death anniversary of its namesake, Jesse M. Robredo, former mayor of Naga City and former Secretary of the Department of Interior and Local Government.

The Museum has four galleries, each showcasing the life and legacy of Robredo from his youthful and formative years to his emergence as a paragon of public service and architect of good governance. The Museum is a reminder of the importance of public service that is grounded on people empowerment and participation, and government transparency and accountability.

In recent years, Museo ni Jesse has subtly evolved beyond its original purpose as a monument to good governance. It has become a de facto platform for Naga City’s emergent art scene. Since 2023, Museo ni Jesse has served as the home for a grassroots coalition of creative and cultural workers from across various disciplines such as visual arts, music, theater, literature, dance, film, and heritage advocacy. The Rigmat Arts and Culture Festival, held annually since August 2023 to coincide with the Jesse Rodredo Day, echoes the model and legacy of people empowerment that has become the contemporary cultural marker and identity of the City of Naga.

February 2: Street Art Exhibit, Magsaysay Avenue

Amidst the busy foot and motor traffic cutting across Magsaysay Avenue is a proverbial hole-in-the-wall one-man art show. The collection of vibrant and colorful pieces is a refreshing break from the grit and grime of urban gray, and the soulless strobe of LED billboards and store signages.

The concept, while not unique, is a necessary subversion of the typically gatekept affairs of the creative and cultural genteel. There are no air conditioned enclaves or hallways, gratuitous speeches and cocktails, and other pretensions. The cracked concrete wall and the dirty sidewalk offer no form of consolation or distraction. Art is all.

Notable is the insistence of the wall that no bill shall be posted, and the manner through which the paintings subvert this. Art should be a platform to cross these boundaries and prohibitions. Art in public spaces makes that a reality.

The artist, Manuel Dondon Medenilla, is among the local pioneers of street art galleries. He, along with a fellow artist, first set up their exhibit in the same spot in 2021 and made waves in the local visual arts scene. He is one of the busiest and most active visual creatives in the City, dividing his time working as a security staff, a head of an art organization, a mentor to young artists, and being an artist-breadwinner.

His street art show runs until February 28, 2025.

February 3: Kinalas

This ubiquitous, no-nonsense dish is the soul food of Naga City. It is a hearty and savory noodle soup dish consisting of meat scraped from the skull and bones of pig or beef and cooked tender. It is served in a bowl of boiled bone broth which is mixed with a gravy made from pig or cow brain, dried shrimps ( hibe ), fish sauce and other seasoning. It is then topped with noodles and garnished with fried garlic bits and spring onion. Optionally, it is topped with egg, lechon kawali, or pork rind crackling ( chicharon ). It is also best paired with turon, empanada, puto, or pan legaspi. A pro-tip: always have a small towel with you.

It is a gastronomic social equalizer, enjoyed to the last slurp by both the working class and the upper crust. The best places to enjoy this dish are in the unassuming hole-in-the-wall diners, apartment garages converted into makeshift restaurants, and backstreet eateries. These spots are not hard to find : Dayangdang, Diversion, downtown, uptown, everywhere. All throughout the day, you will find these places packed with diners. This is because kinalas is consumed any time of the day, in both rainy and scorching weather.

To the Nagueño, it is a dish to be savored in an almost ritualistic fashion. While waiting for your kinalas, you prepare the sacrament by grabbing from the counter as much siling labuyo as your constitution will allow, crush them in a small bowl, and then mix with calamansi, seasoned vinegar, or MSG. Then you slurp the soup and noodles while piping hot, generously adding a peep of the labuyo mix to every spoonful. Typically, you go for the soup first and then bring your bowl to the kitchen and then ask for a refill of the soup and the gravy. And then you go until the last noodle string and the last spoonful of soup, sweating all the time.

The Portuguese historian Marcos de Lisboa attested to the existence of kinalas as early as the 16th century. Nagueños and Bikolanos have been enjoying the dish for at least 400 years. Not even Taste Atlas can easily debunk centuries of tradition. After all, the proof is in the eating.

February 4, 2025: Boses ni Lolo

This Bikolnon song bagged second place in the 1st Bicol Music Festival which was organized and held by the Bicol Heritage Foundation at the City of Naga in August, 1982. The anthemic “Bicolano Ako” earned top prize in the inaugural edition of the music festival.

Since then, “Boses ni Lolo” has attained the same status as “Sarung Banggi” and “Si Nanay, Si Tatay” as among the most iconic folk songs in and of Bikol.

Boses ni Lolo is original Bikol-language music composed by mutitalented Engr. Henry Turalde, a son of San Miguel, Bula, Camarines Sur. He is an alumnus of the University of Nueva Caceres and the Camarines Sur Polytechnic Colleges.

The song highlights the value of family in the Bikolnon psyche, and the power of music to both cross and connect generations. Love erases the boundaries of time, death, and generational divides. Music serves as a potent vessel of memory.

Note : This video is a rare one in that it features the original composer and performer, Engr. Henry Turalde. This video is part of Bikol Vibes, a local cultural initiative with the purpose of bringing original Bikol-language music to a younger audience. Check out some of the featured OBM here :

YouTube : https://www.youtube.com/@BikolVibes
Facebook : https://www.facebook.com/bikolvibes.obm/videos

February 5: Taoist Temple, Balintawak St.

The Chinese impact on the culture and commerce of Naga City is frequently overshadowed by Spanish and ecclesiastical influences. But it is to be noted that the Chinese, particularly those who migrated from the Fujian province, preceded Spanish colonial presence and were a primary force in shaping the flow of the economy along the riverine areas of the region. Parallel to this is the infusion of traditions, beliefs, and practices that are still evident in modern and contemporary times.

One of the enduring aspects of the Chinese influence is the belief in and practice of Taoism, as seen in the presence of the Taoist temple along Balintawak St., adjacent to the Naga River.

Taoism is a Chinese philosophy and belief system attributed to the sage Laozi. It emphasizes and teaches harmony with the Tao, the natural way of the universe. This harmony is achieved through an ethical balance between the oppositional yet complementary forces and concepts of the Yin and the Yang.

The Taoist Temple in Naga City echoes the principle of harmony. Nestled in the heart of the city’s old business district with the busy public market, the renascent PNR station, the grind of backstreet warehouses, and the bustling retail and wholesale stores surrounding it, the temple offers a much needed peace and respite from the noise and the traffic. The auspicious and decorative arched gate leads to a spacious courtyard that offers a beautiful view of the river, of the vibrant flow of commerce across, and of the sky.

The temple is a round structure flanked by a retinue of dragon statues guarding against the forces of misfortune. The altar is an impressive assembly of objects and statues that represent both the external Taoist cosmos and the internal alchemical rituals that a practitioner observes to attain symbolic immortality.

The Taoist Temple used to be located on the corner of the streets of Prieto and Elias Angeles. Its current location along Balintawak Street makes it an ideal place of meditation and relief from the brisk pace of urban living.

February 6: Plaza Rizal Street Food Scene

Downtown Naga’s energy and wakefulness shift into a higher gear as the sun sets. While most tenured establishments start to close shop for the day, canopied carts and counters start to pop up like colorful toadstools of nylon, tarp, and pongee. Foodmongers start to stoke the embers in their charcoal grills, fire up their butane or kerosene stoves, and heat up their food warmers. Soon, an assortment of food aromas begin to mix with the scent of early evening rush hour.

The street food culture in Naga City is an evolving gastronomic landscape of complexity and variety. Just a few years ago, most of the fare offered consisted of the typical fishball, kikiam, kwek-kwek, bulastog, and sweetened drinks such as palamig, buko, blue lemonade, and pineapple juice. The classic street grill, with its impressive spread of various offals, is a constant. Of course, there is also balut, “dirty” ice cream, and assorted nuts.

As the flavor sensibilities of the street food enthusiasts expanded, there was a demand for foodmongers to offer new choices. French fries and leche flan became favorites. But as the market for street food became more competitive, the menu grew bigger.

Indeed, the street food culture in downtown Naga has become a viable alternative to expensive restaurants. Now, it is common to see students on tight budgets and career professionals conscious of their budgets hunkered down on stools and small foldable tables or standing shoulder to shoulder before a food cart counter sipping their beef pares or scarfing down their chicken pastil. Squeezed between the larger pares carts and rolling pandesal stalls are vendors hawking skewered goat meat, deep fried chicken skin, buttered corn-off-the-cob, and dim sum.

Foodmongers have also become quite creative in their offerings, portions, and price. Viand-and-rice combos sold on a “buy one, take one” basis are hawked from car trunks and motorcycle top boxes. Cooked to order staples such as sisig and pancit canton are crowd favorites. Foreign-Filipino fusion dishes such as takoyaki, biryani, and Hungarian sausages also sell briskly. Beverages have also become quite diverse. There are at least two small stalls that offer fresh dragonfruit juice. But the game changer for night owls, such as artists and night shift workers, is the evolution of localized street cafes that offer good quality espresso-based drinks and coffee alternatives.

Dining al fresco at the plaza is truly an authentic human experience. Adding to the flavor of the food are the genuine conversations with vendors about life and its ups and downs, the ambient sound of busking musicians, the hopeful stares of stray dogs and cats, the ever shifting social spaces, the surprise meeting with a friend or adversary, and basically contemporary life in both its greenest and its grayest. 

February 7: Bicol Drag PH

The history of drag can be traced back to the theater culture of the ancient civilizations of Greece and Rome. It can also be traced back to the tradition of Chinese opera and Japanese theater forms such as the Noh and the Kabuki. Men dressed up as women and performed roles typically associated with women.

Societal and moral prohibitions in these times prevented women from taking on roles on stage. The practice of cross gender acting was prevalent even in Shakespearean times. As women earned more rights in the modern period, the practice of cross gender acting in the context of theater went into decline.

This art form underwent a revival in modern times as a form of resistance and subversion by Black and Latino performers who experienced social discrimination against minorities and against the queer community. It also evolved as a response against “blackface”,  a practice among white performers to don black makeup in mockery of or to appropriate black culture. Deprived of chances to perform not only in pageantries but also in artistic and cultural spaces, these early drag queens expressed themselves in private balls and before a small but committed audience.

Contemporary drag culture, while mostly appreciated for its entertainment value, retains its subversive tenor. Much like the jesters of the medieval court who used humor and irreverence to critique social injustices, drag queens, in all their vibrant and colorful energy and charisma, satirize the zeitgeist. The drag performance confronts the culture of misogyny and homophobia that still persists in our communities.

In Naga City, the drag culture started as a series of Drag Race Philippines viewing parties at Caffeineight, a small cafe along Jacob St. The camaraderie that evolved from these viewing parties provided the impetus for local drag enthusiasts to gather and organize local events to showcase local queens. This movement, which started late 2023, soon became a collective now known as Bicol Drag PH. 

Bicol Drag PH advocates for safe spaces for local drag queens and queer artists. With the aid of social media, Bicol Drag PH continues to grow, to be seen, and to be heard. With the social stigma associated with drag culture, our queens aspire to transcend the impression that they are merely characters for entertainment or, worse, ridicule. As one queen pointed out, there are layers to a drag performance. It is no different from any art form where the creative works without pause to refine the various aspects of the performance, from fashion, to makeup, to choreography, and to the crafting and internalization of the drag persona through which the performer interacts with the audience.

You can also check out their social  media presence here :
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BicolDragPH
Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/bicoldragph?igsh=ZDB1cGpqbXVyNWxh

The header features the mural art by Raul Alcomendas which was originally located at Minor Basilica and National Shrine of Our Lady of Peñafrancia, commonly known as the Peñafrancia Basilica in Naga City.

About the author:

DENNIS B. GONZAGA: Writer, critic, and academician. Former Humanities faculty at Ateneo de Naga University. Curator of The 416 Art Space in Naga City. Advocate for local culture. AB Political Science graduate, Ateneo de Naga University; MA Asian Studies graduate , University of the Philippines.