We love our two steps forward, three steps back
Published Nov 13, 2022 12:05 am
HEARD IT THROUGH THE GRIPEVINE: OUR NEW ABNORMAL
The Manila Bulletin, led by President and CEO Emil Yap III and Publisher Sonny Coloma, sent a 17-man strong contingent to the Asia-Pacific WAN-IFRA (World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers) Digital Media conference in Singapore last week. It was an enlightening two days of talks and case studies that touched on content generation, business viabilities, and media trends; as shared by representatives of media outfits from all over the world.
Naturally, it was also a great opportunity for many in the group to travel again after the pandemic; and for several, to visit Singapore for the first time. For me, gone are the days when we’d grudgingly call Singapore a city-nation that really works, but in the same breath, say it’s a boring place to live in. The Singapore of today is pulsing, vibrant, and a tourist’s dream destination. The country knows how to blend the modern with its heritage, and you still can’t beat clean, efficient, and safe – whether as a tourist or as a resident.
I mention all of this in light of the experiences our group encountered returning to Manila on Saturday, Nov. 5 (and 6, as it would turn out). One group left on the 2 p.m. Singapore Airlines flight, and landing at Terminal 3, weren’t allowed to deplane for some 90 minutes. The “excuse”? The Terminal 2 gates had been overbooked, and there was a logjam of landed planes waiting to make use of the available gates.
I was on an 8 p.m. PAL flight that was supposed to arrive at 11:40 p.m. Our flight left Singapore past 9:30 p.m., and that meant arriving in Manila a little past 1 a.m. Small mercies were the facts that deplaning and getting our luggage was a breeze; and it just goes to show how conditioned we are to these delays and snafus, that we were all looking for silver linings to this ungodly arrival time.
THE MANILA BULLETIN ‘invades’ the Asia-Pacific WAN-IFRA Digital Media conference, held last week in Singapore.
Two Sundays ago, I wrote about the wonderful efforts of the DOT and the TPB with their Travel Expo which set a record ₱176 million in sales leads. And I just have to say that if we want to realize these sales leads and convert them to repeat business, the scenario of last Saturday is a microcosm of just what is wrong with us, and how for every two steps forward, we’re so ready to take three back.
What would it have been to divert some of the afternoon flights to gates in the other airports; or at the very least, mobilize the buses that aren’t needed for gate deplaning, to these passengers stranded on the waiting planes. It’s like we’re inviting tourists to say the Philippines is made up of wonderful beaches and places, and great, hospitable people – but it’s not worth the aggravation of experiencing their airports and arrivals processing.
Not for anything, if something like this had happened one afternoon at Singapore Changi Airport; I’m certain an official inquiry, and heads rolling, would have ensued. There, from top to bottom, they really take their tourism seriously, acknowledge its contribution to their GDP, and know how it’s a matter of several “moving parts” working efficiently. Just look back to how Singapore flash floods in 2021 provoked public outrage, and the subsequent reaction from the government.
Two photos which encapsulate how Singapore successfully blends the ‘old’ with the ‘new’; a 1939 Chinatown structure repurposed as a hip eating place, and the Botero bronze bird that looks over the river by the UOB building.
Here, as I mentioned, we’re so inured that we all just sigh in relief that we’re finally heading home. Maybe we need more outrage, more of not settling for this dismal list of “fails,” because we do deserve better. Filipinos are so defensive and onion-skinned that I know some will say “Ganoon talaga dito” (That’s just the way it is here), and I question how that attitude will ever lead to our improving or becoming world-class. And I say that precisely because I do care, and not because I’m belittling our country.
I was talking to my youngest son the other Sunday, and as a fresh UP Industrial Engineering graduate, he’s in the management training program of a global tech company. Part of the two-year course includes two stints abroad, and while excited about it, he was saying how he definitely prefers to make his career here – and not stay for any prolonged period abroad. And he deserves better than paltry excuses, and sweeping under the rug, of what happened last Saturday. And I’m not even talking of the numerous social media posts I saw that Saturday of the Metro Manila traffic situation – which, let’s face it, our visitor arrivals would also contend with.
So yes, I’m just one voice, speaking through this column. But I will rant, calling on our President, the Departments of Tourism and Transportation, and airport managers – how can we talk of national recovery and championing Philippine tourism, when micro-managing one afternoon of visitor arrivals is already a spectacular example of failure, and of our culture of accepting mediocrity?
The Manila Bulletin, led by President and CEO Emil Yap III and Publisher Sonny Coloma, sent a 17-man strong contingent to the Asia-Pacific WAN-IFRA (World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers) Digital Media conference in Singapore last week. It was an enlightening two days of talks and case studies that touched on content generation, business viabilities, and media trends; as shared by representatives of media outfits from all over the world.
Naturally, it was also a great opportunity for many in the group to travel again after the pandemic; and for several, to visit Singapore for the first time. For me, gone are the days when we’d grudgingly call Singapore a city-nation that really works, but in the same breath, say it’s a boring place to live in. The Singapore of today is pulsing, vibrant, and a tourist’s dream destination. The country knows how to blend the modern with its heritage, and you still can’t beat clean, efficient, and safe – whether as a tourist or as a resident.
I mention all of this in light of the experiences our group encountered returning to Manila on Saturday, Nov. 5 (and 6, as it would turn out). One group left on the 2 p.m. Singapore Airlines flight, and landing at Terminal 3, weren’t allowed to deplane for some 90 minutes. The “excuse”? The Terminal 2 gates had been overbooked, and there was a logjam of landed planes waiting to make use of the available gates.
I was on an 8 p.m. PAL flight that was supposed to arrive at 11:40 p.m. Our flight left Singapore past 9:30 p.m., and that meant arriving in Manila a little past 1 a.m. Small mercies were the facts that deplaning and getting our luggage was a breeze; and it just goes to show how conditioned we are to these delays and snafus, that we were all looking for silver linings to this ungodly arrival time.
THE MANILA BULLETIN ‘invades’ the Asia-Pacific WAN-IFRA Digital Media conference, held last week in Singapore.
Two Sundays ago, I wrote about the wonderful efforts of the DOT and the TPB with their Travel Expo which set a record ₱176 million in sales leads. And I just have to say that if we want to realize these sales leads and convert them to repeat business, the scenario of last Saturday is a microcosm of just what is wrong with us, and how for every two steps forward, we’re so ready to take three back.
What would it have been to divert some of the afternoon flights to gates in the other airports; or at the very least, mobilize the buses that aren’t needed for gate deplaning, to these passengers stranded on the waiting planes. It’s like we’re inviting tourists to say the Philippines is made up of wonderful beaches and places, and great, hospitable people – but it’s not worth the aggravation of experiencing their airports and arrivals processing.
Not for anything, if something like this had happened one afternoon at Singapore Changi Airport; I’m certain an official inquiry, and heads rolling, would have ensued. There, from top to bottom, they really take their tourism seriously, acknowledge its contribution to their GDP, and know how it’s a matter of several “moving parts” working efficiently. Just look back to how Singapore flash floods in 2021 provoked public outrage, and the subsequent reaction from the government.
Two photos which encapsulate how Singapore successfully blends the ‘old’ with the ‘new’; a 1939 Chinatown structure repurposed as a hip eating place, and the Botero bronze bird that looks over the river by the UOB building.
Here, as I mentioned, we’re so inured that we all just sigh in relief that we’re finally heading home. Maybe we need more outrage, more of not settling for this dismal list of “fails,” because we do deserve better. Filipinos are so defensive and onion-skinned that I know some will say “Ganoon talaga dito” (That’s just the way it is here), and I question how that attitude will ever lead to our improving or becoming world-class. And I say that precisely because I do care, and not because I’m belittling our country.
I was talking to my youngest son the other Sunday, and as a fresh UP Industrial Engineering graduate, he’s in the management training program of a global tech company. Part of the two-year course includes two stints abroad, and while excited about it, he was saying how he definitely prefers to make his career here – and not stay for any prolonged period abroad. And he deserves better than paltry excuses, and sweeping under the rug, of what happened last Saturday. And I’m not even talking of the numerous social media posts I saw that Saturday of the Metro Manila traffic situation – which, let’s face it, our visitor arrivals would also contend with.
So yes, I’m just one voice, speaking through this column. But I will rant, calling on our President, the Departments of Tourism and Transportation, and airport managers – how can we talk of national recovery and championing Philippine tourism, when micro-managing one afternoon of visitor arrivals is already a spectacular example of failure, and of our culture of accepting mediocrity?