One of the major cities outside the National Capital Region is Lipa City. It is located in Batangas Province, part of the CALABARZON economic zone of the Southern Tagalog region.
Lipa City is the central and richest part of the vast Batangas province. It is a landlocked city but is considered as a stand alone state because of its almost complete facilities in its own vicinity. It is also considered as one of the major economic center of the province as well as for the whole region. From Manila, the traveling time to Lipa City is more likely to take 4-5 hours of travel via the South Expressway-Star Expressway. On the other hand, if you prefer to travel taking the Manila-Cavite-Batangas route via the Aguinaldo Hi-way to Tagaytay, it will most likely take you around 5-6 hours because of heavy traffic in Cavite's industrialized regions.
Probably one of the main attraction you can find in Lipa City is its ever famous architectures that dates back during the time of the Spanish occupation of the country. The San Sebastian Cathedral is definitely the most famous among these architectures. It is a big cathedral that stands as living proof of the nation embraced catholicism for many centuries ago, gaining the country the title 'biggest catholic country in Asia'. Before, Philippines is the only catolic country in Asia but recently South Korea embraced the religion setting their ancient religion only as secondary. Every Sunday the cathedral holds a mass every hour to cater the regular thousand attendees for the whole day.
It is also made famous by its leaders. The former film and television artist Vilma Santos, or known as the 'Star for all Season' used to be the mayor of the city and now serves as the governor of the whole province. It is also famous because of the parish priests that held the cathedral. Many Archbishops of the country came from the San Sebastian Cathedral even before their ordination as Archbishops. The late Cardinal Jaime Sin and the present cardinal, Cardinal Gaudencio Rosales both hailed from San Sebastian Cathedral.
Lipa also has a lot of recreation areas. It has both SM Shopping Mall and Robinson's Mall. It also has a considerable number of educational establishments including big universities and colleges, both state-owned and private entities.
Lipa City, a city that holds modernity with its economic approach while still able to maintain its beautiful past. Its truly worth a visit.
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