Carabao-Carroza Festival: Pavia's feast spans 34 years
The carabao-carroza race
* With inherent ingenuity and creativity, Filipinos have transformed the carabao into an artful testament of our industry, dependability and resourcefulness and many communities recognized its immeasurable contribution to our local economy, history and culture
The nature of agriculture changed considerably in centuries. With the scientific revolution encouraging experimentation in agriculture, a new period of global exploration introduced in rural agricultural society brought notable inventions on farm machinery such as the mechanical improvements in the traditional wooden plow. This has revolutionized agriculture. The power capability of machines has led to higher productivity with a significantly reduced workforce.
Even with these innovations, many farming communities especially in rural Philippines still depend on domesticated animals, used as a draft animal since ancient times.
The domesticated water buffalo, or carabao, is the most popular and common throughout the Philippines. It is associated with farming because it helps farmers in cultivating the soil, and growing and harvesting the crops. Carabao-drawn carrozas or carriages have also long been used to ferry people and produce from farm to market and plying fundamental routes and thoroughfares in the midst of war and peace.
The carabao-carroza parade
With inherent ingenuity and creativity, Filipinos have transformed the carabao into an artful testament of our industry, dependability and resourcefulness and many communities recognized its immeasurable contribution to our local economy, history and culture.
In Pavia, carabaos are the biggest crowd drawer with the town’s tradition of carabao racing, leaving it mark as one of the most entertaining festivals in the province of Iloilo. The Carabao-Carroza Festival is a fun-filled event showcasing the native field animal. It has become more than a celebration to the town. Attracting many, it is considered as one of the biggest tourist attractions of the province and has enjoyed great success over the years.
The celebration features a procession of 18 well-groomed and painted carabaos attached in well-embellished bamboo carts or sleds used as alternative floats for their muses. It also displays the barangays’ produce. Barangay officials proudly parade down the long stretch of Ungka-I to the High School grounds of Pavia National High School where prizes awaits the most beautifully decorated cart and carabao.
Practiced over the past 34 years, the carabaos compete in a friendly race considered as a local sport in the community. Carabao-racing fans travel in huge numbers to the highlight event of the celebration. The race occurs on the flat surface of Pavia National High School grounds and is run at a distance of a hundred meter.
With this years’ theme “LGU - CHURCH - NGO Sustainable Partnership for a More Progressive Pavia,” the Carabao-Carroza Festival gives visitors a colorful glimpse of the towns’ rich culture showcased through their series of special events.
The Grand Opening Parade with the Opening of Agri Fair and Food Festival took take place last April 24, 2007 at 2 p.m.; BMX and Mountain Bike Competitions in Barangay Mali-ao last April 28 at 9 a.m.; the Carabao-Carroza Festival Parade takes off at Ungka-I to the High School Ground on May 3 at 7 a.m. alongside the Carabao-Carroza Race at 9 a.m. and the Grand Coronation of the Carabao-Carroza Festival Queen at the municipal plaza at 9 p.m. The town’s Fiesta Day celebration takes place on May 4, 2007.
And there is more to Pavia than this. Visit the century-old Byzantine structure of Sta. Monica Parish famous for its walls of red bricks and window frames of coral rocks. It serves as the town’s centerpiece---mute yet eloquent reminder of a colonial past bequeathed to the present. The artistry of Pavianons specifically in the neighboring barangays of Jibao-an and Pandac, clearly defines and proves the town’s worth as the declared “Pottery Capital of Iloilo.” Try out its famous 'baye-baye', a native dessert heavily based on pinipig (a by-product of rice milled, cooked and flattened) and coconut cream. Experience the dizzying variety of palate-pleasers casually prepared in a garden setting at the Pavia Garden Center in Barangay Mali-ao. Also regular events are the Tigkaralag Festival celebrated every October 31st and Pavia Blooms in October, two stirring special events of the town annually supported by the local government unit headed by their very energetic and supportive mayor, Hon. Arcadio Gorriceta.
A prosperous town of dynamic people, Pavia has come a long way from an abandoned place, to being the regions’ Agro-Industrial center boosting 27 big manufacturing establishments as of the year 2000. Quietly situated north of Iloilo City, this 2,703-hectare fourth-class town with 18 villages is just 9.6 kilometers or a 30-minute jeepney ride away from the main urban district. Pavia gained its territorial independence from Jaro in 1921.