Scattered even until now – a week already after Camarines Sur’s celebration of the “Kaogma Festival” are posters and streamers in burning colors proudly blazing the “hottest festival in the world”. Not only eyecatching but even pregnant with varied interpretations, the slogan seems to best describe the true situation obtaining in the regions’ premier province.

        Viewed from the angle of environment, the festival is indeed hot in terms of the climate. Although summertime is about to take its exit, the unpredictable occurrence of sporadic rain has made the temperature much hotter.

        The celebration highlighting the province’s brightly-colored history which Camarinenses ought to be proud of, lends indubitable basis for its primordial role in the fields of sports, tourism, art, literature , music and the like. In keeping with such rich history, the provincial leadership is justified in featuring activities like the Tour of Camarines Sur, Miss Kaogma Festival, Battle of the Bands and of late, the public presentation of the capitol’s very modern project sprawling on a more or less, 4.5 hectare area, featuring off-road racing, wake boarding, water skiing, and jetskiing in a man-made lake.

        Many more activities which in the not-so-distant past could have been merely part of a dream are now stark realities. As usual, since these projects are indicative of rapid change, certain sectors cannot help but wonder whether the future could afford the cost of maintaining all of these. Changes , as usual, meet opposition, skeptic or not.

        On our part, we prefer to join the dreamers, for meaningful development only belongs to them. After all, success awaits those who dream and find ways and means to transform them into reality. Failure and frustration belong to those who are afraid to dream and are even more scared to see them become real. They are negative thinkers.

        That is why we cannot help but sing Allelulia to the present provincial leadership. Its directions are so dynamic and too awesome that one cannot help but wonder how to be in cadence with the trend of the times.

        There is however, that nagging concern on whether all these efforts could reach a rapid crescendo that only those who have the means could endure, catch up with the speed. A case in point is the clear direction that Camarines Sur is being transformed into a tourist hub. There is nothing wrong with such development thrust. The point is, where do we put the concerns of the ordinary people such as those of the farmers, the food producers, the fishermen and the like?

        It cannot be denied that the concerns about rural roads, small scale food production, health care have been relegated to the background, if not, neglected consciously or not.

        There is that disturbing concern that Camarines Sur will indeed become a tourist haven and yet its developmental efforts are truly the hottest in the world that they have become too hot for their own people to handle.

        In the final analysis, how shall we rate all these developmental efforts in terms of per capita income, is the question.