Today, May 8, Tolosa, my hometown celebrates its fiesta. It’s St. Michael’s feast day in this town.
Tolosa is an interesting story of ironies, a small town that has refused to grow, is how I’d like to describe it.
But this small town is home to biggest superstar in the region if not the country, the former First Lady Imelda Romualdez Marcos. Tolosa is a Romualdez town.
It is also the hometown of many other successful personalities like our cover story Vicky Palana.
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I was looking for beautiful success stories in the Eastern Visayas to play up in OpinYon when Vicky Palana’s success in the USA was brought to my attention.
I graded the story perfect for inspiration.
It is no less inspiring than the stories of world boxing champion and former senator Manny Pacquiao who also hails from our region and the country’s first mother today, Imelda.
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I always remember Tolosa to be a clean town, starting with its public market. It has the cleanest public market that I’ve seen. No one is selling anything there. Tolosanos go to Dulag or Tanauan for their marketing.
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It has its share of World War 2 heroes like the three boy scouts who saved thousands of lives in the east shores of Leyte from the indiscriminate bombings by the American forces in the return of Gen Douglas McArthur.
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But generally, the town is still poor, stuck in the bottom of ratings in the province of Leyte’s ranking of towns.
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Up here in Luzon, a city in the province of Laguna, an LGU official who is rumored to be romantically involved with a married man got caught on an FB post being embraced by the married man.
Staff of another councilor to her boss:
“Konsi si ma’am immortal pala. Kita sa picture sa FB.”
Councilor: “What you mean, hindi na mamatay si ma’am? Anak, it’s immoral not immortal.”