World City Guide

Key Attractions

Rizal Park
A substantial open green area that showcases Manila at play, 58-hectare (143-acre) Rizal Park is one of the largest parks in South East Asia. It is also known as Luneta, after the area it replaced. Its local significance can be gauged by the fact that it is named after Dr José Rizal, the great Philippine anti-colonial fighter and thinker. He is memorialised in the Diorama of the Martyrdom of Dr José Rizal, which becomes a son et lumière exhibit after sunset, and his remains were interred in the Rizal Monument in 1912. The many ornamental gardens include a re-creation of the entire Philippines archipelago in the eastern ponds. There is also a Japanese Garden, a Chinese Garden, an Orchidarium, a chess plaza and a skating rink. The museums and public buildings within its precincts include the Museum of the Pilipino People (see below). In the morning, residents assemble to practise tai chi, Philippine stick-fighting or sundry forms of martial arts, while on most Sundays, there is a free ‘Concert at the Park’ in an open-air auditorium.

Taft Avenue to Manila Bay
Opening hours: Daily 0700-1900 (ornamental gardens).
Admission: Free.

Intramuros
The original city, founded in 1571 by the Spanish, Intramuros is located on the southern bank of the Pasig River. Substantial sections of the encircling wall, which was begun in 1590, remain, including a number of decorated gates. In fact a poorly defensible site, Intramuros was the locus for most major conflicts and invasions to befall the pre-independence Philippines, culminating in the devastating Battle for Manila, between the Japanese and Americans, in 1945, in which over 100,000 locals died. The surviving walls have been restored and many attractive historic buildings still remain within their precincts, while a walk beneath their ramparts gives a colonial experience hard to match in modern Asia.

Opening hours: Daily 24 hours.
Admission: Free.

Fort Santiago
One of the oldest and most dramatic colonial buildings in the Philippines, Fort Santiago was built to guard the entrance to the Pasig River and dates back, in its oldest sections, to 1571. Its most famous prisoner was the national hero, José Rizal, who spent his last days here before his death at the hands of the Spanish in 1896. More recent memories of tyranny include the legacy of wartime Japanese occupation, when Philippine freedom fighters suffered and died here. In another cell block, American POWs were left to be drowned by the rising tide – this was one of the rumoured resting places for the legendary wartime trove of Yamashita’s Gold and the victims’ last resting place has been much disturbed by treasure seekers. The Japanese used Fort Santiago as their final redoubt against American forces and the fort was correspondingly damaged. It has been rebuilt as a park, with its own resident theatre company. At its heart is the Rizal Shrine, which contains very crypto-Catholic relics of the hero – one of his vertebrae, the first draft of his novel Noli Me Tangere or Touch Me Not (1887) and the original of his death poem.

Entrance at end of General Luna Street, Intramuros
Tel: (02) 527 2889.
Opening hours: Daily 0800-1800 (fort); Tues-Sun 0800-1200 and 1300-1700 (museum).
Admission charge.

San Agustin Church and Museum
One of the few buildings in Intramuros to survive the carnage of the Japanese invasion substantially intact, and Manila’s oldest stone church, San Agustin Church was completed in 1606. Its present interior murals post date earthquakes in 1863 and 1889, which brought down one of its towers. The adjoining Augustinian monastery houses the San Agustin Museum, which contains much colonial religious art, including altarpieces and screens salvaged whole from other houses of worship in 1945.

General Luna Street, Intramuros
Tel: (02) 527 4061.
Opening hours: Daily 0900-1200 and 1300-1700.
Admission charge.

National Museum of the Philippines
Founded in 1901, as the Insular Museum of Ethnology, Natural History and Commerce, the National Museum of the Philippines houses the official national baseline collections in the sciences and humanities, with particular reference to the environment and history of the Philippines. Its holdings are divided into the National Museum itself, housed in the Old Congress Building of the Philippines, and the National Museum of the Filipino People (tel: (02) 527 0213), housed in the former Finance Building. It has many archaeological exhibits of the Philippines’ prehistory, including the skull of ‘Tabon Man’, the oldest human remains in the archipelago. The Museum of the Filipino People collection includes the preserved timbers and treasures of the San Diego, a Spanish galleon that sunk in Philippine waters after a collision in 1600.

Padre Burgos Street, Rizal Park
Tel: (02) 527 1215.
Website: http://nmuseum.tripod.com
Opening hours: Tues-Sun 0900-1700.
Free admission to the National Museum; charge for the Museum of the Filipino People.

Malacañang Palace and Museum
Locally renowned as a historic building, the palace was formerly the summer residence of the Spanish Governor General and is now the seat of government and the official residence of the head of state. Its museum houses mementoes of each successive president of the Philippines. Imelda Marcos’ famous shoe collection was once part of the holdings, although they have now been removed to leave more worthy exhibits.

Gate Six, JP Laurel Street, San Miguel
Tel: (02) 733 3721.
Opening hours: Mon-Fri 0900-1500.
Admission charge.

Chinese Cemetery
Founded in the 1850s, the Chinese Cemetery was designated as the resting-place for the Chinese citizens who were denied burial in Catholic cemeteries. A memorial garden considerably more opulent and bizarre than most of its ilk elsewhere in Asia, Manila’s Chinese Cemetery houses very complete sets of grave goods – tombs outfitted with air conditioning, plumbing, flushing toilets, chandeliers and all other modern conveniences for the well-off corpse. Entire streets are laid out to honour the dead and the status of their surviving relatives. Guided tours around some of the more Baroque excesses are available courtesy of the guards.

South Gate on Aurora Avenue, Blumentritt
Opening hours: Daily 0730-1900.
Admission: Free.