Tourism’s WOW campaign goes to Beijing!

Last week, we were in Beijing, China together with Tourism Secretary Roberto "Obet" Pagdanganan for the opening of the Philippine Tourism Office in the Philippine Embassy there. On hand to greet us for this momentous occasion was Philippine Ambassador to the People’s Republic of China, Willy C. Gaa. The blessing ceremony was a bit austere with only a few guests, mostly from the tourism industry. Our group from Cebu was led by DOT regional director Dawnie Roa, Travelvision’s Jenny Franco and Cebu Chamber of Commerce and Industry Inc. (CCCI) president Robert and Mrs. Judy Go. I also met our Manila media friends like Cornelio de Guzman of Manila Bulletin and Nina Corpuz of ABS-CBN.

After the blessing in the Tourism Office, Ambassador Gaa and Secretary Pagdanganan unveiled the bust of Dr. Jose Rizal in the main embassy lobby. I gathered from embassy staffers that this was the first bust of our national hero of that size in Beijing. Later in the evening, we caught the tail end (we had to go to the Forbidden City, which we’ll write about in our next column) of the presscon for the opening affair at the Wuhan Room of the Kerry Centre Hotel (a Shangri-La chain) in Beijing where we also stayed.

I was quite surprised to see more than 50 Chinese journalists attending the press conference. Because many of the Chinese journalists still have difficulty in learning how to speak in English, the interview took so long as each question and answer had to be translated by an interpreter. Here’s a couple of question asked by the Chinese media: "Why did it take the Philippines too long to establish a Tourism Office in China when the Approved Destination Status (ADS) of the Philippines was approved way back in 1992?" Secretary Pagdanganan replied that tourism wasn’t as intensely pursued then as it is now under the administration of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo (GMA).

One young journalist asked about the impact of Chinese tourism on the Philippines. Secretary Pagdanganan replied that World Tourism Council (WTC) figures reveal that one tourist coming to our shores can generate one job. Incidentally, Secretary Pagdanganan maximized his time in Beijing and was also interviewed for Asia Today by Yang Zengqing of CCTV-9. The formal inauguration ceremonies followed after the presscon where Ambassador Gaa made his welcome remarks and formally introduced Tourism Secretary Pagdanganan to the guests. The evening affair was very well attended with a lot of Chinese tour operators, the media and two top Chinese officials, namely Guan Mu, deputy director of the Asian Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and Huang Guifang, former People’s Republic of China ambassador to the Philippines.

Secretary Pagdanganan introduced me to Deputy Director Guan and when he learned that I was from Cebu, he commented that someday he’d come for a visit. I think it was his boss, the Chinese Foreign Minister, who came to Cebu for the inaugural ceremonies of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. Since DOT regional director Dawnee Roa brought a lot of Cebu Fiesta Islands guide maps, I immediately handed one to Mr. Guan who read it intently, especially when we told him that the DOT head office would be moving to Cebu.

While the presscon was ongoing, Philippine tourism operators who accompanied the tourism secretary held a Travelmart with Chinese tour wholesalers in another area of the hotel. All this was the work of newly installed Tourism Attaché Jazmin Esquerra who was moved from her post in Paris, France to Beijing, as the potential for the Chinese market is extremely huge and very much attainable than the French market.

Ambassador Willy Gaa was also busy holding a consultation meeting with the consul generals assigned in different posts in China, making a strong push for our tourism. I met Hong Kong Consul General Corazon L. Belmonte-Jover, who turned out to be an aunt of Philippine STAR president and CEO Miguel Belmonte. Commercial Attaché Archimedes C. Gomez, of the Philippine Consulate General in Guangzhou, revealed to me that plans were afoot to establish charter flights between Cebu and Guangzhou very soon. Already, there’s a chartered flight between Beijing and Laoag, Ilocos Norte. The next day, Secretary Pagdanganan and Ambassador Willy Gaa attended the opening ceremonies for the Beijing International Tourism Expo 2004.

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I was in my room watching CNN when the news was flashed that Filipino truck driver Angelo de la Cruz had been released by his captors and that the entire nation was euphoric! Well, what can we say, but that President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo (GMA) took a calculated risk and won the day for Angelo de la Cruz. Of course, other nations belonging to the coalition of the willing look at this event as surrendering to terrorism but Ambassador Gaa confided to me that some foreign ambassadors quietly applauded GMA’s decision to save a life.

But is it really surrendering to these butchers disguised as terrorists? I don’t think so, it was merely a matter of sending our very small contingent home a month earlier. It would have been a totally different case if our military contingent wasn’t due to return home yet. But hey, people look at a half glass of water very differently. One would say that it is half-empty, while another would say it is half-full.

I view President Arroyo’s decision from a different angle, that for the very first time ever a President of this country gave so much importance to the life of one Filipino. That alone should go a long way in our national consciousness that after all, the life of a solitary Filipino is worth fighting for and saving. That this decision was in the national interest of the Philippines and that the national interests of the United States and Britain are only secondary to ours.

Indeed for too long, the Filipino as a person has been disregarded as unimportant to our national conscience. What President Arroyo has done was not just to save the life of Angelo de la Cruz, but to send notice to the nation and the world that the Filipino, no matter how lowly his status in life, is still worth saving!

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For e-mail responses to this article, write to [email protected]. Bobit Avila’s columns can also be accessed through www.thefreeman.com. He also hosts a weekly talk show, "Straight from the Sky," shown every Monday, at 8 p.m., only in Metro Cebu on Channel 15 of SkyCable.