• City of Manila

    Manila’s Pontifical and Royal Campus (Part 4)

    Located right next to the St. Martin De Porres Bldg. in the University of Santo Tomas campus is another academic building named after a saint. Despite it being named after a Dominican friar and who is a patron saint of lawyers (especially those studying canon law) and UST offering degrees in civil and canon laws, the St. Raymond of Peñafort Bldg. is not the home of the university’s law programs. Completed in 1955, the building is home to the Faculty of Arts and Letters and the College of Commerce and Business Administration.

  • City of Manila

    Manila’s Pontifical and Royal Campus (Part 3: the medical legacy)

    As interesting as the scholastic legacy, the University of Santo Tomas also bears a noteworthy legacy to the practice of medicine in the country ever since the university first offered degrees in medicine in 1875. UST at the time did not have its own hospital for its medical students to be able to train what they’ve learned. It was decreed instead that the then 300+ old hospital of San Juan De Dios (in Intramuros near the old UST campus) be the university’s training institution for medicine. With the onslaught of World War II in the country, the administration of San Juan De Dios Hospital was given to UST for the…

  • City of Manila

    Manila’s Pontifical and Royal Campus (Part 2)

      Located right across Plaza Intramuros and Benavides on the eastern side is an up-and-coming structure to be opened sometime in the 2nd half of 2011. This would be the 4-storey UST Sports Complex. This would serve as the home of the university’s varsity team the UST Growling Tigers with a gymnasium that can accommodate up to almost 5,800 people, with provisions for holding activities basketball, badminton, gymnastics, table tennis, indoor running track, dancing, and a fitness center. Given the university’s rich athletic history, it will also house a museum showcasing memorabilia like trophies, medals won by the university in various sporting competitions, especially in the UAAP which UST is…

  • City of Manila

    Manila’s Pontifical and Royal Campus (Part 1)

    My previous entry has tackled the story of the quadricentennarian institution that is the University of Santo Tomas, (UST) and the situation that arose by its tricentennial celebration that made it consider to relocate elsewhere so it could meet those needs. The plan was put in place even before the tricentennial, when the Dominicans decided the buy a 21.5 (22 according to some sources) hectare land in Sampaloc, an area known as Sulucan Hills. (interestingly, Sulucan came from either the Tagalog word “sulok” or corner because its location or from “nakikisulok” or living with another’s house which was the situation at the turn of the century as people scrounging for…