Warrior Pilgrimage

Featured in www.pinoyapache.blogspot.com on October 26, 2009

IT WAS IN THE night of September 22, 2009 when Boy Toledo, Ernie Salomon and I, for a change, visited the Cebu South Bus Terminal. Operated by the Cebu Provincial Government, it is located along the Natalio Bacalso Avenue in Cebu City and is in close proximity with the offices of the Land Transportation Office, CITOM and the Bureau of Fire Protection. It is the gateway to the south and west of Cebu Province.

Well, we kind of liked the idea of observing the new system put in place in the said terminal a week after its inaugural. The brainchild of the governor's brother and security consultant, Byron Garcia, it is patterned after the system used in airports and modern seaports. Yet within that span of one week there have been already numerous flak reports and unkind commentaries attributed to the new system in the local newspapers, in radio programs and in istorya.net.

Boy T drove the car through the vehicle entrance and we paid ten pesos after the gate sentries checked the baggage and inside compartments. We taxi on the main thoroughfare after that and parked on a parking bay reserved for buses plying the route for the cities of Dumaguete, San Carlos and Bacolod in Negros and Tacloban City in Leyte. It wasn't busy at that hour the parking bay vacant and a courteous guard allowed us the use the area temporarily.

The bus terminal has two separate entrances for both pedestrians and vehicles and the same number of exits. People on foot seeking access to the terminal as commuters or as send-off and welcoming parties pay five pesos and allowed the free use of the airconditioned departure-lounge areas, clean toilets and lavatories, electric fans and TV sets...READ MORE (Press CTRL + mouse click)