Mindanao - holiday in rebel country
July 1st, 2008
By CHRIS PRITCHARD
Perception is the problem. Or so I’m told. It’s a claim I hear again and again in Davao.
“People believe wrongly that this is a violent destination but it isn’t,” sighs city administrator Wendel Avisado. “We happen to be on the island of Mindanao - and people are warned `don’t go to Mindanao - it’s dangerous’.”
Of Davao’s 1.5 million people, 95 percent are Christian (mostly Catholic). It is reputedly the Philippines’ cleanest city. Streets are swept regularly. Footpaths are dotted with garbage bins. Smoking is outlawed except in designated areas. Taxis are modern and metered, with rip-offs rare.
Crime levels are low. Mayors are powerful in the Philippines and Davao’s, Harley-Davidson-riding Rodrigo Duterte, runs a tough-guy administration that keeps the streets safe.
Davao is one of Asia’s most fascinating holiday destinations. Direct flights bring in tourists from Singapore and Hong Kong (including many expatriates resident there). Other visitors, including package tourists from South Korea - the Philippines’ number-one market - transit through Manila.
But few Australians are to be seen, because of travel warnings to keep out of Mindanao.
The Philippines government is fighting a long-running war against Muslim separatist guerillas, some belonging to the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and others supporting a more radical breakaway called Abu Sayyaf.
Kidnap and murder are real risks in some parts of the big island - closer to Zamboanga and Basilan, for instance. Sadly, this unpleasant fact has impeded tourism growth in tranquil Davao.
The national picture doesn’t help. Criticism inside the country cites poor transport links and below-standard airports as reasons tourism isn’t surging.
Tourism secretary Joseph Durano recently acknowledged a target of five million tourists a year by 2010 is unlikely to be met.
So, the Philippines remains a bit player on the Asian tourism stage. Australians and others throng Thailand and Bali but a comparative trickle reaches the Philippines.
Bali is a sore point in Davao. Officials contend that, while violence in some parts of Indonesia doesn’t stop foreigners streaming to Bali, incidents elsewhere in Mindanao succeed in derailing Davao’s tourism growth.
This seems a pity because Davao is a splendid and easily reached destination. A modern city, it boasts malls and markets (with cheap shopping), tropical parkland, diverse cultural attractions, good golf courses, white-sand beaches, white-water rafting, hiking, memorable restaurants and superb resorts.
For instance, I check out the Pearl Farm Beach Resort. Tourists snorkel in clear water, some go wreck-diving, a few laze in hammocks on over-water balconies. Dining is five-star and accommodation is as good as at the best Thai or Maldivian resorts.
It’s often full and staff tell me Hong Kong, Singapore and Germany are key sources of custom.
Food in this port city is very seafood-oriented. This is no surprise because tuna-fishing is one of Davao’s main industries.
Local delicacies include panga (grilled tuna jaw) and kinilaw (marinated raw tuna). Among many fine seafood restaurants, the no-frills Luz Kinilaw excels.
However, the main attraction bringing tourists here is the Philippine Eagle Centre, an hour’s drive from the city. Its aim is to save sorely endangered Philippine eagles, of which only 500 pairs are believed to survive in the wild. Logging and encroaching farming are destroying their habitat.
The centre welcomes visitors as a means to fund its work. Thirty-two eagles live at the centre, half of them captive-born.
The Philippine eagle is awesome - and among the world’s largest birds. It weighs up to 7kg, with a two two-metre wingspan.
While some birds are captive-bred, others are retrieved by farmers who find them injured on the ground. Others were pets kept illegally and confiscated by authorities.
The centre frees some birds in remote forests.
Captive breeding involves a bizarre artificial insemination programme. Human surrogates live with the birds in their nests - enormous structures allowing the birds to fly and build high platform-like nests.
Birds in the breeding programme are shielded from seeing other eagles and so regard the surrogate, who spends many hours with them, as an eagle. Surrogates wear protective leather clothing but nevertheless bear scars from being affectionately clawed and pecked.
When the time is deemed right, semen is collected manually from a male bird and spirited to another cage where a surrogate has earned the trust of a female - which permits fertilisation.
Staff resorted to this method of captive breeding after finding easily-stressed eagles failed to breed if anaesthetised for fertilisation.
A local contact points me to Davao’s oddest lodgings: Ponce Suites Gallery Hotel. A 30-roomer, its exterior is encrusted by giant sculptures. Internal corridors are filled with hundreds of paintings and sculptures - some using junk such as discarded typewriters or electronics.
All are the work of a famous Philippine artist named Kublai (real name: Rey Mudjahid Ponce Millan but he uses his nickname).
“It’s only 10 percent of my work,” the prolific artist tells me in his hotel’s rooftop bar-restaurant.
Kublai drives me to the neighbouring province of Davao del Sur. We cross plains of rice, climb through mountainous farmland and small villages for nearly two hours - and, finally, park beneath Agung House, a giant modernist sculpture that contains a two-bedroom house with a view of Mt Apo, tallest peak in the Philippines.
Next day I venture north to another neighbouring province, Davao del Norte, to visit members of two of Mindanao’s 13 tribes. Traditional weaving is demonstrated and tribal music performances draw crowds of village kids.
In the province’s Tagum City, I stop to admire the world’s largest Rosary (85.5 metres long and made of balls of wood) before visiting Muslim members of the Kalagan tribe.
Tribe members tell me they earn their money collecting mud crabs from the mangroves. (Some Muslims don’t eat seafood but this community does.)
Modernity has had its impact. Members of the tribe tote mobile telephones, wear designer sunglasses and live in relatively affluent circumstances.
At a park outside Davao called Eden Resort, I see full-size replicas of traditional-style dwellings of Mindanao tribes. Customs of different tribes are explained.
“Elsewhere in the Philippines, less of the age-old tribal culture endures,” says Professor Jowel Canuday, a Davao-based authority on the area’s indigenous culture.
“It’s a pity more people don’t see it - before it’s gone.”
IF YOU GO
Philippine Airlines flies between Australia and Manila, the Philippines capital, with frequent 90-minute jet connections to Davao.
Alternatively, Davao is served by other carriers’ non-stop services from Hong Kong and Singapore.
Australian and most other passport holders do not need visas for holiday visits.
$A1 buys about P41 (Philippine pesos) ($NZ1.30).
Pearl Farm Beach Resort is an opulent resort reached by short launch transfer, Waterfront Insular Hotel is an upscale resort-setting property only 10 minutes by metered taxi from downtown and Ponce Suites Gallery Hotel is a delightfully quirky art-filled hotel with rooftop restaurant-bar surprisingly modestly-priced in the mid-market niche.
The Australian government’s travel advice website currently advises against visiting Mindanao. However, aside from Australians, tourists are plentiful: direct flights bring visitors from Hong Kong and Singapore (including many resident expatriates) to resorts such as the Pearl Farm. Korean package tourists are also numerous.
Source: http://www.stuff.co.nz/
Entry Filed under: World Tourism News
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