“We went there just to watch someone being nailed on the cross?”

And so asked my younger brother Andre Sandino on our family’s way home from Mantalongon, Dalaguete in Southern Cebu where we spent the Holy Week to witness the Pasyon sa Mantalongon last March 21, 2008.

Apparently, local Mantalongon residents, along with people from neighboring towns and barangays, the Cebu City-based media, freelance photographers, road trippers (like Eloise who have more artistic photos of the event here), and foreign tourists also went out of their way to be in Cristo Rey Mountain Park, Mantalongon first hand to watch the live reenactment of Jesus Christ’s crucifixion by Gilbert Bargayo.

The holding of the Good Friday event faced stiff opposition from a reactionary local official who sent goons to threaten local residents from participating in the Pasyon, absurdly thinking that it would diminish his feudal influence in the area. This, however, did not prevent more than 10,000 to 15,000 people (according to police estimates) from witnessing the affair.

So here are a few crude pictures of last Friday’s extraordinary happening in Mantalongon, which is Cebu’s summer capital and vegetable basket (click the photo for the full image):

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