‘… you can imagine what a country like the Philippines is missing out on because we are not on the radar screens of foreigners out for holiday fun.’
TODAY, I celebrate my third birthday. Well, only figuratively speaking actually because I celebrate my real birthday in September.
But three years ago, on March 30, 2021 to be exact, I was rushed to St. Luke’s BGC as a “COVID-19 critical” patient, requiring immediate infusion of the anti-COVID medicines of the time as well as being attached to a high flow oxygen machine. I spent three days in the emergency room because all private rooms were occupied, and it was only on the fourth day that I was moved, finally, to the tenth floor, where Rose, my nurse, gave me plasma from a previous patient as well as tocilizumab, that IV drip that had to be enclosed in black plastic to protect it from sunlight.
On April 12, about six kilos lighter, I walked out of my tenth-floor room to head back home. I had survived to tell the tale.
(It was, by a nice coincidence, also the birthday of one of my closest friends, Louie Montalbo. Happy birthday. Louie!)
Those COVID days were lonely days, when people realized what it meant to be alone, and were scared (and scarred!) by the experience. When they got the chance to get out and circulate again, how they did!
This brings me to my topic of today: have you ever noticed that unlike some of our neighbors there really isn’t one big Philippine holiday that gets foreigners tripping to our shores in droves?
Our Christmas tourist influx may be something someone would point out, but frankly? It’s a trickle.
Contrast our experience with how the Chinese New Year lures tourists to Hong Kong, for example.
Or how Songkran clogs up the airports and roads of Thailand.
Or how the cherry blossoms lure people from all over the world to Japan.
In those countries, their national holidays are holidays for others as well. I don’t think this can be said of much of our own.
Which is well and good given the state of infrastructure we have at home. I need not reiterate what I have said so many times about airports in the Philippines.
Traffic? Let’s leave the last say to Cold Play.
Other inefficiencies in our systems? My lips are sealed.
But you can imagine what a country like the Philippines is missing out on because we are not on the radar screens of foreigners out for holiday fun.
It may be fun in the Philippines — but it just happens to be more fun anywhere else.
