Cagayan de Oro: a place full of energy

CDO lies on the southernmost island of Mindanao. This island has always strangely attracted me since the first time I was planning a trip to The Philippines despite Mindanao has a very bad if not scary reputation because of Muslim terrorists/independentist. During my stay almost 50 soldiers were killed in the provinces of Cotabato and Maguindanao, nonetheless Elio had a waiter from this area who was supporting his fellow citizens because he said Philippine government try to steal their land in any way whereas they lived these places long before the Spaniards and then the americans colonized this region.
CDO is a middle size town, 600.000 inhabitants, quite congestioned by heavy traffic, some nice place like small street with tiny carenderia, coconut and fruit stalls, a shabby park, in other words it's not a charming town. Davao neighter is but before it has the beautiful Samal and Talikud islands for example. Surigao also is not a charming place but has a nice Luneta Park, many small islands and not only Siargao (famous for beginner surfers), but CDO has really nothing else than a modest but famous White Water rafting and at 3 hours distance a huge and tall zipline park in the beautiful region of Bukidnon.
But I loved this town because his dwellers are so amazing, curious, friendly, warm, sometimes crazy like a few freelance prostitutes who offered me many different services for a pizza or jollyBee meal.
The nightlife in CDO is surprisingly hectic, too many pubs, live music bistrot (Lexis Bar, Lokal and Led), a couple of discos and for the nightclub addicted also several strip-tease clubs like Coras and Coras 2. But also youngsters training their dance steps, their instruments or their tango coreography on the divisoria sidewalk.
At lunchtime I enjoyed one of the many dirty cheap and friendly carenderia whereas for nighttime an uplevel meal of various types was available on the Limketkai area (Jerry's Grill, Siam Thai and Ramentei).
Pure energy, this place was just great!!!