National Maritime Week 2007
National Maritime Week in the Philippines is an annual opportunity to celebrate the lives and work of seafarers. It is also a time to remember those who have died at sea. AOS port chaplain Father Jack Walsh sends us this report of events in Davao.
On the morning of Monday 24 September, Davao City began a week-long celebration to honour the maritime industry and the people who make it possible. There was the traditional “blowing of the signal horns” of all the ships in the port area extending from Sta. Ana Wharf along more than a dozen public and private company ports on the shores of Davao Gulf. The ships in port were decked out in a multiplicity of signal flags. Later, a motorcade travelled from Magsaysay Park to Holy Cross of Davao College which was the centre of the celebrations.
Students of the graduating class of the college’s Maritime Department began the programme with an impressive silent drill. In the college gymnasium, the invocation was delivered by Fr Jack Walsh of AOS. Following the invocation, there were talks by Mrs Nanette Z. Villamor Dinopol, the Directress of the Region XI office of the Maritime Industry Authority (MARINA) and City Councilor Leo Avila, Chairperson of the City Council for Environmental Concerns. Students of the maritime colleges within Davao city presented entertaining and lively dance numbers.
The weeklong programme of tribute to the national maritime industry included symposia on health, environmental and career development issues. As in previous years, volunteers from the maritime schools participated in a “blood-letting”, a mass donation of blood to the Philippine Red Cross. Another traditional event was the Memorial Mass celebrated onboard the M/V Filipina Princess in honour of the Filipino men and women who had died at sea during the past year. Mass was followed by the fluvial procession around Davao Gulf during which seafarers’ families and maritime students honoured the deceased by casting flowers into the waters.
click here to read more about AOS in the Philippines
click here to read about National Maritime Week in previous years