A Walk Along the Streets of Filipino History (Calle Crisologo)

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Have you ever wanted to travel back in time during the Spanish colonial times? There are a lot of places around the country where you can experience such. Different Spanish artifacts and structures are all over the continent. Churches, cobbled streets, and dishes are the most common traces of Spanish colonial times in the country. This one site I have visited really had a grasp on my curiosity, Calle Crisologo in Vigan. Calle Crisolog or Mena Crisologo Street depicts the luscious lifestyle our ancestors once lived because of the Manila-Acapulco maritime trade. Filipino-Chinese traders took advantage of the trade industry offering goods ranging from abel cloth, indigo, gold, tobacco and other goods that were transported to Vigan from all over the North. A stretch of cobbled street lined with old houses, calesas along side the street waiting for passengers. It was like a piece of Filipino history encapsulated in time. The old structures were converted to either restaurants, hotels or souvenir shops and the street is absolutely mayhem due to the number of guests walking pass us. Just give it some time and if you are willing to wait by the time the stalls close, usually around 10pm then that's the time you get to experience the sense of being transported back in time. The sound of horse shoe hitting against the cobble stone and the orange lit street gives you a taste of history on how was it way back then when the our ancestors walked these streets. There is an eerie feeling of being watched from the old wooden window panes from the old houses and the frightening feeling of being watched by Spanish soldiers from behind.

The old-fashioned houses lined with red bricks, huge wooden doors, and sliding wooden windows covered with capiz shells are picture-perfect. Surviving through different tests of time the owners of these historical treasures who whole-heartedly submitted themselves to preserve such structures should be commended for a job well done. One can admire closely the amount of craftsmanship put into these buildings when you step inside of some of the houses and even spend a night on some converted ancestral houses into inns.

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The street is as exciting during the day but we opt to head to the street at night and try to experience the "Magic" like what people and locals say- to enjoy the calle you should visit it when all is quite. Restricted to vehicular traffic, the stillness and the shadows from the street lights fells like more of the 18th century experience. We took advantage to take some snapshots at the middle of the street and sat on one of the wooden shacks made for visitors to rest and just enjoyed the view.

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Photos

Calle Crisologo
Picturesque nightscape of the Calle