The Feast of the Black Nazarene in Quiapo, Manila: A Religious Celebration of Mardi Gras Intensity

Quiapo Church, Manila-- The biggest religious event and celebration in the Philippines-- the Feast of the  Black Nazarene or Pista ng Itim na Nazareno-- happens every year on the 9th of January . Beginning with a holy Mass held in honor of  the Holy Nazarene on the first Fiday of the year, the celebration culminates with a grand  procession where the Black Nazarene, a life-sized,  dark-colored sculpture of  Jesus Christ, bearing the cross on his shoulder, is the focal point.

The same day each year, thousands  of devotees in maroon-colored shirts and several replicas of the dark-colored statue become the usual sight around the Quiapo Church area and its surrounding streets.

Favorite Travel Photos of 2010: A Look Back at Our Top 10 Favorite Travel Photographs of The Year

August 17, 2010 is when this blog was born and launched into the travel blogosphere. It's barely half-a-year old and already 2010 is over. Before Lakwatsera or I make the first official  travel post for 2011, We would like to share our favorite travel pics of 2010.  As already mentioned in the About Us page of this blog,  Lakwatsera and I are not travel writers or photographers, and for that reason, we are not sharing these pictures because we think they are great or of good technical quality; we simply want to share our own images  of places that were most memorable to us in 2010. Because we both keep regular nine-to-fives, we did not have the time to post all of our travels (together and separately) in 2010. Hopefully, 2011 will give us more time to sit and think about the forgotten details of our untold or unshared travel stories.  For the  meantime, We've rummaged through old files of  our combined 2010 travel  pictures and would like to share10 of our favorites: