”Claim your firearms and other deadly weapons here,” reads a sign at Manila Airport, sounding an ominous note that shouldn`t preclude a visit to the Philippine Islands today.
The Philippines long have suffered what might be called ”bad press.”
First there was World War II and the only visitors they received was invading armies. Now newspapers routinely report violent clashes involving urban guerrillas, Muslim dissidents and the Communist New People`s Army.
The NPA is said to control areas where 20 percent of the population lives, and its increasing strength–plus burgeoning public anger at the erratic and authoritarian rule of President Ferdinand Marcos–finally forced the ailing leader recently to call special elections for Jan. 17 to demonstrate that he isn`t totally without support.
But vote fraud is nothing new here, and since the blatant airport slaying of opposition leader Benigno Aquino in 1983, most people are willing to say that anything can happen.
All of this is bad for tourism which, in turn, is bad for the economy. But for the traveler it means uncrowded hotels, restaurants and beaches, and it means good values–prices on the islands are, in general, low. Getting there is another matter. In the off-season Philippine Airlines sometimes offers a package which includes round-trip air fare from the West Coast of the United States and three nights in a fine Manila hotel for approximately $800. In December, PAL`s roundtrip price from Chicago is 1,308 and in January it`s $1,200.
Despite the political turmoil, neither the police nor the military seem to be an oppressive presence, and the biggest hazard visitors face probably is traffic jams and overeating.
The best reason for going to the Philippines is not that you probably won`t get caught in a crossfire of warring factions, but because this republic of 7,100 islands is a beautiful country populated with beautiful people and there are a lot of interesting things to do.
The Philippine archipelago spreads across 500,000 square miles of Pacific Ocean and South China Sea, but daily flights make it possible to explore three major regions–the main island of Luzon, Cebu and Mindanao, the land of the Muslims–on even a brief trip.
Most visitors start their Philippine vacation in Manila, as I did, perhaps staying in the venerable Manila Hotel, now restored to its former elegance. This is where Gen. Douglas MacArthur made his home from 1935 to 1941, and part of his quarters are now for rent as the MacArthur Suite.
An easy walk from the hotel is the Intramuros, the remains of the old walled city and the fort built by the Spanish in the 16th Century. And be sure to check out Casa Manila, three carefully restored period houses reflecting life here for the well-to-do in the last century.
I got a glimpse of how Manila`s rich and poor live simply by riding through the city. A taxi took me past the exclusive residential estates in Dasmarinas Village and Forbes Park on my way to the Manila American Cemetery, a 152-acre oasis of calm where the remains of 17,206 World War II dead were re-interred after temporary burial elsewhere in the South Pacific.
For a closer look at the city, I paid about 15 cents for a ride on the new 14 kilometer Light Rail System. It bisects the city and gave me an elevated view of crowded housing, squatter huts and streets clogged with people and vendors as well as traffic.
Another simple pleasure was an afternoon stroll through the Ermita area of central Manila, a collection of shops, restaurants and bars flavored by second-story VD clinics.
There are a variety of one-day side trips out of Manila, including the Pagsanjan Falls river trip, one of the strangest rides in the world. After all, you don`t often boat up rapids before shooting down them.
After changing into a bathing suit at the Pagsanjan Rapids Hotel for what promised to be a wet voyage, I settled behind another rapids-shooter in the bottom of a dugout–a banca–and we were off. Our boatmen, bare-footed in T-shirts and shorts, had arranged for a tow by an under-powered banca upstream to the first rapids.
The river is not swift, but an abundance of boulders, some half the size of a garage, challenge the navigators. They were constantly in motion, nimbly shoving with a foot here and a paddle there to avoid obstacles.
The banca had seen better days. The top three inches of the port side were mostly missing and the stern sported a large hole–a new banca cost $450 and our boatmen just couldn`t afford one.
The job is hereditary. Our captain was the son and grandson of boatmen and proud of his skills. He makes two round trips on most days, more on busy weekends, and earns about $3.25 a trip, including tips. It`s a fair living these days in the Philippine countryside.
The pushing and shoving of the boatmen became more vigorous as we entered a narrow gorge with sheer rock walls rising up to 300 feet, bristling with trees, bushes and small waterfalls–and site of a few scenes from ”Apocalypse Now.”
Our target, Pagsanjan Falls, is a two-stepper, with a lower cascade thundering into a large pool. Here, another set of sailors pulled passengers across the pool on a bamboo raft which barely missed the main torrent.
The return trip, downhill with the current, was much swifter and easier, except for the sudden stops at choke points to avoid collisions with other bancas. Traffic jams are a normal part of running the Pagsanjan Rapids. The only thing missing is stop signs.
There are picnics and there are picnics, but the kind put on in Zamboanga in Mindanao is special, from coral heads to a Muslim cemetery.
At 9 o`clock one morning, I clambered into a pump-boat, the local name for a motorized vinta or canoe. With two outriggers cutting the chop on Basilan Strait, it was only 15 minutes before we coasted ashore on Great Santa Cruz Island, four kilometers from the city.
A short walk along a ”pink” coral beach brought us to an unkempt Samal cemetery. The graves of the Muslim faithful are enclosed in low fences and the remains of cotton canopies, with miniature wooden vintas to carry the spirits of the dead to heaven.
Back at our base, a roofed shelter surrounded by bougainvilla flowers, I rented flippers and a face mask for $1.60 and flopped into the water, emerging seconds later with a nose full of water. I had forgotten how to snorkel. Several nosefuls later, I finally mastered what is relatively simple and began floating in the shallows, admiring the marine life unfolding beneath my face mask, careful to observe the first law of snorkeling: Don`t touch anything with bare hands. What impressed me most were little electric blue fish cruising around the coral heads and a starfish that looked like a five-pointed confection topped with chocolate chips.
Noon brought a meal like none previously experienced.
Our party gathered around a table in the shade of the shelter, with banana palm leaves as plates, and feasted with our fingers on crab, shrimp, maya maya (red snapper), longaniza (homemade pork sausage), seaweed salad and rice, all washed down with San Miguel, which in the Philippines is a synonym for beer.
For dessert, there was durian, that fabled fruit of the Orient that is said to ”smell like hell and taste like heaven.” (It is also supposed to be an aphrodisiac, as are so many other things in Asia that you tend to lose track.)
The durian, pumpkin-sized and protected by sharp spines and a thick skin, is best opened with a bolo. There, in sections, are plum sized nuts encased in a layer of pulp. The pulp is what you eat.
Ours did not live up to its billing.
It did not smell–not a single nose wrinkler. And it tasted like stringy, oversweet custard. No stimulation, either–so much for Asian erotica.
The next day I was able to sample the best of Zamboanga. This included a stop near the docks at a copra warehouse where men were bagging coconut for shipment to a mill. Copra makes the local economy sing. In one small community, soft drink sales multiply five-fold when copra prices are strong.
There was time to see Rio Honda, a village of palm roofed huts built on stilts, and the Yakan Weaving Village where natives dye their own yarn and create multicolored cloth on hand looms. But my schedule did not permit a night in the fully equipped, one-room Tree House built by a nostalgic mayor for everyone, first come, first served.
Cebu, 55 minutes north of Manila by air, is best known as the city where the Spanish explorer Ferdinand Magellan was killed in 1521. The cross he erected is still preserved.
In the Philippines it`s not the heat that exhausts you, it`s the humidity, but I found enough energy to visit the Taoist temple, 16th-Century Fort San Pedro, San Agustin Church built in 1565, and a factory where skilled workers hand-craft concert-quality guitars ($250, U.S.) as well as less expensive stringed instruments.
Exhausted after watching a workman saw away at a slab of cumagong wood for 30 minutes to recover one small sheet of ”raw material,” I relaxed in the sun at Tambuli, one of Cebu`s favorite beaches, before retiring to the Cebu Plaza, where double rooms go for $35 a night, and where $5 lasts a long time at the blackjack table in the casino.
Baguio has nothing in common with Cebu but friendly Filipinos. In a few hours you shift from the heat of the beaches to the cool of the mountains.
Baguio sits on a plateau nearly one mile high, amid pine-clad hills. It was the unofficial ”summer capital” of the Philippines in the days before air-conditioning when island leaders and everyone else who could afford to, fled the humid lowlands.
This is a jumping-off spot for visits to the Ifugao rice terraces, several hours away by car. Alas, there was not enough time for this side-trip and I had to content myself with enjoying the coolness and browsing through Baguio`s public market.
Barter is the name of the game in public markets the world over, and in Baguio it has been refined to a fine art form. Here, men, women and merchandise of all kinds meet nose to nose, seven days a week, 365 days a year. The Philippines may be Catholic, but nothing is sacred here, not even Christmas or New Year.
”Saturdays and Sundays are our busiest periods,” the market master told me, with thousands of sharp-eyed shoppers doing battle with 1,200 permanent and 600 transient vendors in acres of covered and open stalls. There are no fewer than 35 sections, selling almost anything you can name and many things you can`t, including vegetables of all kinds, fruit, fish and footwear, sugar and bulk sea salt, meat and poultry, flowers and tobacco leaves, clothing, hardware and handicrafts, fan-shaped Baguio brooms, woven baskets and rattan furniture.
Fresh coconut is ground on the spot with a special router-like device that removes the flesh from inside the nut.
I was told the market draws goods from a 100-mile radius and prices are supposedly 15 percent below those in conventional stores. This is easy to believe. Overhead is certainly low enough. Vegetable vendors are charged 30 cents a square meter a month, with $33.50 the top monthly rent for a stall.
Buyers and sellers pay a penalty for the bargains. Illumination is often dim, drainage leaves much to be desired and open ditches and garbage pits await the unwary. But if you`d wanted elegance instead of adventure, you`d probably be shopping in a fancy department store, anyway, right?
First-time visitors to the islands should consider the three-day, two-night PALakbayan tours from Manila. There are 16 destinations from which to choose, with costs ranging from $59 to $172 a person, double occupancy, covering round-trip air fare, accommodations, airport transfers, breakfasts and other amenities.
For more information about Philippine vacations, contact a travel agent or the Philipines Tourist Information Center, Suite 111, 30 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, Ill. 60602; phone 312-782-1701.
