"Discovering Boracay, Philippines"

About fifteen years ago, my sister Dot had a Boracay vacation and narrated to me how beautiful the place was. That time however, I took her description of Boracay like a grain of salt primarily because at that time I regularly traveled to Palawan at least once a month as part of my work with the Department of Agriculture to monitor a Foreign-Assisted Project that we implemented, and Palawan was simply amazing. Secondly, I grew up in a town facing Mindanao sea and our house was only 10 meters from the shoreline. So, swimming was part of my childhood like breathing and walking, I regularly swam and played on the beach. The beach though has black sand. Nonetheless, I cherished those moments on the beach with my playmates.

Last month however, our youngest daughter gifted me and my wife a roundtrip ticket for two to Boracay. According to her, it was her gift for our 27th wedding anniversary last 17 January. So, we did not have a choice.

I went through our pre-travel activities with some hesitation not only for the two reasons I mentioned above, but because of a more important reason: I heard that everything is expensive in Boracay! Anyway, weeks before our departure, I asked for a leave from my office since my daughter booked us for January 15 to 17 which were working days. I contacted an officemate whose parents own a resort in Boracay to book for a room for the days that we will be in Boracay.

My officemate told me that I should extend my stay because the feast of Sto. Nino will fall on the 20th of January and the town of Kalibo which is where the Cebu Pacific Air plane will land for our Boracay trip will be celebrating Ati-Atihan in honor of Sr. Sto. Nino. Realizing that I have not attended Ati-Atihan ever since, I revised our vacation schedule: We will stay in Boracay from 15th January to the 18th, and move to Kalibo and join the “sadsad” of the Ati-Atihan till the 20th.

I made arrangements with Cebu Pacific for the flight changes and had to pay penalties for it. I was given a four-day leave by my office. Likewise, I did not accept any taping/shooting commitments for the period. I missed a chance to appear in GMA’s Zaido, I got a text message for an offer to play the role of an environmentalist. But, because of the planned vacation, I declined the offer.

The flight from Manila to Kalibo, Aklan was a short one, only 35 minutes by Cebu Pacific Air’s Airbus. There are alternate flights Manila to Caticlan being served by Asian Spirit and SEA Air but smaller aircrafts are used. To compete this alternative flights, Cebu Pacific Air has already scheduled opening flights form Manila to Caticlan using smaller aircrafts too. That’s how large the volume of passengers going to Boracay is.

Nagmamahal,

Edgar Sandalo