Memorials

In other countries, war memorials are among the top tourist destinations. The kind of care lavished on them merits their classification as national shrines.

War memorials are among the biggest tourist draws in Hawaii. Washington is dotted with memorials to those who died in different wars since the nation’s birth. The thousands who were killed in the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001 – casualties of the US war on terror – have their own memorials in New York and Washington.

The South Koreans have shrines dedicated to the wars they have fought and those who died. They have built memorials not only in their own country but also in the Philippines, which sent a military contingent to the Korean War.

In Japan, public officials shrug off condemnation by the country’s World War II enemies and continue visiting the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo, a memorial to the 2.5 million Japanese who died in the war, including 14 men convicted as Class A war criminals.

Japanese officials aren’t the only ones who like visiting the shrine. On Aug. 15 last year, which marked the 68th anniversary of Japan’s surrender, a whopping 175,000 people visited the shrine – up from the 161,000 in 2012.

There are also war shrines in the Philippines. But perhaps it’s true that we have short memories, or maybe we don’t like remembering unpleasant events. Also, paying tribute to heroes can be confusing when monuments are built for movie stars by politicians trying to win brownie points during elections.

The average Pinoy is no avid visitor of monuments to heroes of wars and the Philippine Revolution. So it was a pleasant surprise for me to visit the Dambana ng Kagitingan or Shrine of Valor on Mt. Samat in Bataan for the first time and see it teeming with visitors during the Holy Week break.

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It surely helps that Mt. Samat offers a spectacular view of Manila Bay and the Bataan peninsula. That massive cross also draws crowds. The steep, winding mountain road leading to the shrine was full of hikers, mostly students, some of whom probably started out from Kilometer Zero of the Death March.

In the scorching afternoon heat, there was an endless stream of people climbing up to the foot of the huge cross, and a long line waiting patiently for their turn to take the elevator up to the arms of the cross. The marker says the shrine was built under Ferdinand Marcos, whose generation experienced the war and values wartime memories.

The museum is air-conditioned and visitors heeded the warning against taking photos. I learned a lot more about the Death March, where my paternal grandfather was a survivor. The entire shrine experience is worth the three-hour drive from Manila and the entrance fee of P25 per head, plus P10 for the elevator ride.

If those in charge of the shrine want to keep the entrance fee low and accessible to the most number of Filipinos, they need funds from elsewhere to maintain and improve the site.

The museum, for example, can use glass enclosures to protect many of the exhibits. Video and interactive presentations can be added. The museum sign and lamps at the entrance were not in place when I visited, and the main exhibit hall at the lower level had flies, probably from the stinking toilet outside.

Whether at our premier airport or in our war memorials, we seem to have a problem keeping public toilets clean and with running water and toilet paper. At the shrine, you need to use a water pail for flushing. Instead of functioning as “comfort rooms,” our public toilets provide discomfort and ruin an otherwise pleasant tourist experience.

We also have a problem installing garbage bins to discourage littering. This lack was evident in some areas of the shrine.

The shrine management and the Bataan government should also consider inviting fast food chains or food entrepreneurs to set up shop near the shrine. If you’re driving all the way from Metro Manila, the only decent place for lunch for miles around charges P650 for entrance alone. Lunch is in a restaurant with no air conditioning and, in the absence of window screens, swarms very quickly with flies as soon as the so-so food is set down on the table.

If you refuse to fall for this tourist trap, the only alternative for food along the highway dotted with markers of the Bataan Death March are stalls selling uraro (arrowroot biscuits), cashew nuts, turnips, watermelon and Death March souvenir t-shirts.

With its wonderful views of Manila Bay and the South China Sea, Bataan would benefit from better tourism infrastructure. From the shrine I could make out the Manila skyline across the bay in the afternoon haze.

There can be a ferry from the Cultural Center of the Philippines complex to a spot where a shuttle can pick up visitors going to the Dambana ng Kagitingan. Corregidor has benefited from such boat tours that start from the CCP wharf.

More visitors mean more earnings and improvements for the shrine. War teaches people of all ages to put national interest above self. This is something that seems to be lacking in our present society. War memorials tell citizens that sacrificing for one’s country gets the appreciation it deserves.

Mt. Samat should be as accessible and popular as the Pacific War Memorial in Corregidor, where the “Brothers in Arms” sculpture has a poignant message: “In these hallowed surroundings where heroes sleep / May their ashes scatter with the wind and live in the hearts of those who were left behind. They died for freedom’s right and in heaven’s sight / Theirs was a noble cause.”