GENERAL TRIAS CITY, Cavite--"Nandoon kaya si Robin Padilla? (Will Robin Padilla be there?)" one middle-aged woman asked another.
"Oo, nandoon yun! (Yes is there!)" the other woman replied as they waded through vehicles that have been forced to a standstill along Arnaldo Highway toward General Trias Sports Park here.
The location was the site of the UniTeam grand rally Tuesday night, March 22, where popular actor Padilla--a senatorial candidate inside the surveys' "winners' circle"--was expected to seranade the crowd with his signature campaign song "Wonderful Tonight".
"Masakit na sa binti, 'teh (My feet are already hurting, sis)," the first woman, who has probably been walking for a good length of time amid the traffic along with hundreds of fellow Padilla fans--and maybe some hopeful Sandro Marcos fans, too.
Not even 15 minutes later, Padilla's crooner voice was faintly heard singing, "It's late in the evening"; the two women, still a few hundred meters or so from the jam-packed sports parks, didn't make it to their idol's live performance.
Walking from the All Home shopping mall to the sports park is usually just a 20 to 25-minute gig; on Tuesday night, the 1.4-kilometer walk took at least an hour, no thanks to Arnaldo Highway being transformed into a parking lot due to the sheer amount of vehicles there.
Even motorcycle and bicycle-riders couldn't get to the rally that much quicker since they had to negotiate what narrow path they had with the UniTeam supporters who elected to walk instead of waiting for nothing inside various buses and vans.
There wasn't a shortage of people walking in the other direction, either. "Hindi na ako nakapasok, ang kapal na (I couldn't get inside anymore, the crowd was too thick)," said an eldery woman.
Unlike the two Padilla followers, this woman wore a t-shirt with the faces presidential candidate Bongbong Marcos and vice presidential bet Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte on it. But she wasn't going to see the UniTeam duo in person.
Not that night at least. Perhaps they will come back again, since Tuesday was actually the administration ticket's second go-round in this vote-rich province since the campaign period began last Feb. 8.
Such was the plight of rally-goers Tuesday in what turned out to be another "statement" gathering of Marcos and Duterte supporters. The sports park was literally spilling with people, evoking images of the similarly impressive Marikina City riverbanks crowd of just a few nights ago.
Staff sergeant Jason Olivar of the General Trias police station estimated the grand rally attendees to have been around 90,000-strong.
This is not too far from the figure provided by Cavite Governor Jonvic Remulla, who pegged the people inside the sports park to be around 100,000. However, he claimed that there were tens of thousands more who tried to get in.
Remulla was one of the main organizers of the grand rally.
In a statement Wednesday morning, March 23, the Lakas-Christian Muslim Democrats (CMD)--Mayor Duterte's poltical party--desricbed the Cavite gathering as "the biggest assembly of supporters of ."
It further claimed that the latest UniTeam rally "probably eclipsed the attendance during a similar rally in the area that was held by the camp of another presidential candidate more than two weeks ago", referring to opposition leader Vice President Leni Robredo.
Cavite has 2.35 million registered voters spread across 829 barangays, Remulla said. (with reports from Carla Bauto -Dena)