‘We just seem to have a penchant for complicating things, for making things less efficient.’
WHAT’S with Philippine airports? We seem like the only major city in Southeast Asia where a passenger, local or foreign, has to go through a host of security checks manned by private security guards who demand to see your ticket or boarding pass and your identification before entering the airport.
This used to be true of all airports; thankfully, they’ve been taken out of the NAIA terminals 1, 2, and 3. However, you still see them right before you get to the security check.
But in terminals outside of Manila? Oh, they’re there.
Methinks someone won the bid to deploy security (blue) guards at our airports and they need to be given something to do.
Will taking these guards away make our airports more risky? Like maybe a terrorist will walk into the air terminal check-in area and blow up the whole place? Well, whether it’s Bangkok or HCM or Singapore of Hong Kong, there are no such guards on duty. Are those airports at greater risk than ours? I don’t think so.
We just seem to have a penchant for complicating things, for making things less efficient. And you and I know why – because someone makes money out of the inefficiency.
Let’s leave our airports for a while and talk about our roads. Not about the state of the paving, which is fair to pot depending on where you’re traveling. But don’t you notice how our roads are dark? Turn off the headlights of the vehicles and it’s total darkness. Oh yes, they do have street lamps but they’re either few and far between or the lights are so weak. In the age of solar panels and batteries, can’t this be improved? Fewer lives will be at risk.
Same with street signs. Drive down from BGC towards Nichols at street level and you’ll see signs that alert you to NAIAX. But the signs are so close to the actual on-ramp itself that you can miss the sign and miss the on-ramp itself (I did). Why we don’t put signs much in advance of where they’re needed escapes me. My late co-host and fellow commentator at DWWW 774, Lilibeth Nacion, used to rant and rave about this. She’s been dead for over a decade but our street signs remain poor.
At night, it’s hard to read the signs whether they’re street names or exit signs along our expressways. Not only are they hard to read, but by the time you see them, you’ve missed the exits.
Another nagging issue is poor maintenance of painted lines on our roads, be they the yellow or white lines in the middle or the white lines that mark the edge of roads, especially outside of Metro Manila. When I’m blinded by the headlights or an oncoming car, I try to look for the white lines at the edge of the road to make sure I’m on the right side of things.
Thank God for those cat’s eyes that are beginning to crop up in many places making some roads look like airport runways. I wonder though: how much do those metal things really cost in comparison to how much the contractor charges the government?
Sorry if I’m venting in this space but once in a while the “little things” get to me because, in my book, we should have these little things.
But this is the Philippines. We still have some ways to go before being truly at par with our neighbors. And I’m not talking about Singapore or even Thailand. Now, even “little” Cambodia welcomes more tourists than this country which should be “wowing” the world.
Let’s get rid of these little things. They’re low-hanging fruit anyway.
