Museo De La Salle

June 4, 2016

De La Salle University-Dasmarinas Cultural Heritage Complex, Dasmarinas, Cavite.  Cavite is huge, and Dasmarinas is not as easy to reach from Santa Rosa as one might imagine.

From the Santa Rosa Silang border, specifically the Laguna Technopark and Paseo, it is best reached (for me at least, let me know if there is an even better route) via the "Cardiac Trail" at South Forbes, bgy. Inchican Silang...the road beside SMC's Wedgewoods.  Scenic and quick enough. May get confusing, what with a lack of signages through hills and little barangays, but following a compass and map (GPS) can help.  Of course, there are tricycle drivers and sari-sari store owners to ask.

Through to Silang town to get to the Emilio Aguinaldo Highway.

For a trip back up to Tagaytay then,it's just the Emilio Aguinaldo Highway all the way.  Well, not really "just" that.  Dasmarinas, Cavite is notorious for its traffic jams on the main road.  Especially on Saturdays. And this was a Saturday.

Shaded and lovely University Avenue, where one of three DLSD gates is located

Well, photos are not allowed inside much of the Museum, so...snippets of its surroundings in De La Salle Dasmarinas instead.

  

Beautiful, gorgeous campus!

I do cherish my Jesuit education...but I wish I had it in this campus, with this kind of heritage consciousness.  The La Salle Brothers have it, led by Bro. Andrew Gonzalez, from whose family a large part of the museum's collection comes.  It was his idea to build it, actually, per the museum guide.

central quadrangle of the COLLEGE OF TOURISM (and Hospitality Mgt I think?)

Admin building, a replica of the Kawit Cavite shrine

The chapel, a replica of one in Bulacan, if I remember right

There is a lake on campus

Museo foyer

on the Tagaytay Ridge

http://www.dlsud.edu.ph/Museo.htm

http://www.dlsud.edu.ph/museo/history.htm

Jose Rizal would have been 151

...on June 19.  Here are snapshots of his shrine in his hometown of Calamba, just about three toll exits away from the Eton exit, through a mess of tricycles and jeepneys, past the SM Calamba and sticking to the right side of the road, over a railroad track you can easily miss (because of the shanties, carts, people, vendors right ON the tracks); a dangerous crossing. 

I should have but didn't have the heart to capture the mess in photos.  It's a sorry range of emotions, feeling inspired by, proud of, and interested in Jose Rizal's life while wondering what exactly he would write about the town now.  On the way, there are interesting old structures still well-maintained, like the Farmacia Lina, but generally, a drive through this Burgos st. is...I have no words.

Inside the house, one of the first exhibits describes the place as all ricefields.
There is also a photo of the railroad track as it appeared in his day or a little past his time...with the backdrop of Mt. Makiling, the tracks are on bare land.

One of the highlights of showing children replicas of bahay-na-bato like this one, is when they see the wooden-benches of the toilet.  Just before that, usually the stone stove or adobe ovens elicit oohs, but the toilets always win the most ahhs.  And then of course, the kid loved the bucket and well.

I came here when I was young but only now have I learned that the  original house was destroyed and this is a replica. It doesn't matter.   Rizal's spirit is here and inspires me to read the Noli and Fili again, out-of-school.

 

Houses by the Church

   Houses by the town plaza, the church and the town hall were owned by the town's prominent citizens.  In the Philippines, we can still see many such houses, made of stone, with wide windows and imagine veiled women walking toward the parish at dawn on a Sunday. Having grown up in Metro Manila, and with no province of my own to visit, I do not have the sense of daily living in a provincial town that some friends and relatives enjoyed.  Maybe this is why I have been making a big deal of Sta. Rosa being actually a beautiful, historically and culturally wealthy old town. 

     I do prefer this "new" side to live in, that is to say, the barangays Santo Domingo and Don Jose. Sometimes though, the noveau nature of life here, fast surrounded by the usual food and services franchises can feel...boring.  I mean,  at Paseo de Santa Rosa, with its Kanin Club, Poquito Mas, Umenoya and Ippon Yari in the beginning, I thought this place would have its own charm.  Now there's no stopping its yearning to become a Makati Commercial Center. Even Alabang Town Center has its own atmosphere. Still, the Paseo area probably retains its own ambience (like that of its lone strip of an arcade with the bike shop and Safari car rental over a decade ago), somehow.

    The bayan has these old homes, with one structure, the Casa Zavalla open for visitors. It is a short walk from the church and close to its mortuary. They host some sort of "pulungan" sessions weekly.  There is a cafe as well.  With our luck, again, it was closed. This time, with chains and a padlock.  It seemed empty, most likely for the Holy Week.  Sayang, the museum security man excitedly told us we could have a snack and view antiques at the same time. 

 The wooden plaque says 1888-1997.

 The casa sits on a corner (of Zavalla St. I think). This is the casa from the corner. Why is there a bell tower?

 Interesting fish carving there.Must return to ask about it.

 The front entrance

 View of the church from the casa. See the Lipat-bahay ad on the electric post? Where's the "Tubero" signage? So like the Philippines :-) 

 structure next to (or part of?) the museum

 Note the Z on the grillwork. This house is a clinic.

 A huge, seemingly vacant house

He stands across the town plaza, in front of a tiangee, in front of Mercury Drug (which was, curiously, closed).  I'm sorry I do not know who he is and I was in the car at the busy intersection, being rushed by a traffic aide to go.