Pico Pico Travelogue

Work in progress, still trying to understand sectioning.

Ang Bagong Paliparan ng Lungsod ng Iloilo

So let me tell you about my flight last week from Tokyo to London (via Johannesburg) on Singapore Airlines First Class (Boeing 777-300ER).

Okay, so you don’t buy that. Okay, it was actually Cebu Pacific 5J245 from Manila to Iloilo (is it less of an airline, or less of a flying experience, when it’s only an alpha+numeric combination, instead of a more appropriate PR, AA, CX or SQ?). This was a significant trip for a bunch of reasons. This is one trip in a while where I have not resolved to do some refurbishing at home, which always drives my already half-crazy parents even crazier. Next, at a time when I should start seriously considering what to do for the rest of my life, a thought process that I should have embarked on 35 years ago, I actually have a few small prospects in mind back home. Third, which is what actually triggered this blog entry, is our spankin’ new airport. Opened a couple of months back, this is the first time this taxpayer gets to use it. Friends and relatives have raved about it, and now, I can finally get to confirm whether they were indeed right, or they are just a bunch of impressionable manolings.

You’d Think I’d Ask For A Window Seat To Have A Really Good View of the Wing?

Doggie Takes A Plane Ride, Too

Spankin’ New Airport, Jologs Pax
Leaving for the airport a full three hours hours early after a neightbor friend’s over-eager Ilonggo staff took a 5:50 AM taxi request as 4:50, we took the C5 route after radio warnings of a “nakakatakot” 3-bus pile-up in Mantrade Ayala, wherever that is. Did get there a little too early but better that than feeling my heart stuck on my throat as the cab navigates the rush hour traffic.

A rather indifferent Cebu Pac check-in staff was behind the counter. I always take an aisle seat but in cases when it’s a new destination, and a flight duration of less than 3 hours, it’s a window seat (I just lurv visiting airports and looking at airplanes but more on that some other time). Maybe her ChizWiz ran out that morning, maybe it was their tight new uniform, but no smiles, no greetings and the window seat she got me was nearly right astride the wing, so instead of a good expansive view from the oval window, i got half an aeronautical wing and a really good facial suntan (which worried my good mother – Is my son really working for a school, or loading cement bags in the South Pier). But never mind, craning my neck to see the other window in front is not much of a, well, stretch.

Flew out a tad more than half an hour late, it was the usual Cebu Pacific affair: new Airbus 319’s, neither newspaper nor refreshments, corny Gimme! Gimme! game with even cornier prizes (“Cebu Pacific, the only airline in Asia Pacific that offers in-flight games!” claimed the stewie). But pretty good inflight magazine, probably explained by the G’s publishing arm doing a ton of others including Men’s Health. (Disclaimer: made a pleasant discovery of a nephew writing and photo-ing an article in the same issue. Okay, he’s an in-law nephew, but still.) Sat next to a senior citizen lawyer who tried to sell me 6,000 square meters of “potentially commercial or bodega-use” land 600 meters from the new airport, and who actually admitted he had a drink too many the night before, but I digress.

One thing that struck me as we did our initial descent was the very lush green cover that lead towards touchdown. Maybe it was because the rains have come, maybe that area of Cabatuan and Santa Barbara is blessed, but yes, it is a sight rarely seen these days. Another topographical feature was the uneven terrain; a wide expanse of considerable mounds (I wouldn’t call them hills). I would have thought that that would make the site a bad one to build an airport, but was told by Mr. Prosecutor that this is actually the site of the airport of the occupying Japanese and American forces during the war, and surely the current Japanese consultants wouldn’t have accepted the project if it was not ideal. Oo nga naman. The Americans and the Japanese. They always know what’s good for us. Touche’!

No More Chaos & Mayhem: Two! Count ‘em. Two luggage carousels.

Checking Out Luggage: O’der, O’der, We Must Have O’der!!!

The flight was not too bad, can’t demand too much from a ticket bought on sale (despite the spotty record of the G’s in business, they have been good philantrophists, and have enabled every Juan to afford to fly (witty quote courtesy of their their witty ads). In the same way that we have China to thank for cheaper consumer goods, never mind that it has given bad quality a good name, 5J (there it goes again) flights, have made flying a lot more accessible to everyone. Take that PAL! (And for the PAL diehards, it has made PAL a better airline, no?)

Ikebana Iloilo. Nothing like fake plastic orchids to add a touch of elegance and jet set flair to the men’s CR.

In Iloilo, Our Urinals Are Big

Going out from the metal tube to those accordion ones that protect poor old paying passengers from inclement weather, it essentially signified that Michael Lim has arrived, and on a more metaphorical level, YESSS! Iloilo has arrived. Marble & granite, check. Modular and tubular, check. Modern and almost stark architecture, check. Glass walls (Is that Pa and Ma on the sidewalk waving at me?) all around, check. The airport does look good, although a bit small but hey, this ain’t Kansai. But just three passenger tubes. Does that mean if PAL, CebuPac and AirPhil arrived at the same time, which happens often, we can start bitchin’ again?!?

I had the brilliant idea of taking out my new nokfon and take pictures of objects other than my various body parts. Here are the ‘ers unloading the baggages, oh look, here comes a dog cage. Here’s the sign that says Iloilo Airport (thank god, not Raul Gonzalez or some DBM (dead brown male)). Here are the two, count ‘em, two!, wonderful new luggage carousels that go this way and that. Those baggage carts, you mean I really don’t have to pay Bernie Miaque to use them?!?

One standard in testing out any new facility are the loos. The old airport’s were in a sorry state but I must say the maintenance crew did a valiant effort to keep them usable. How does the new one fare? Off I went in service of my multitude of blog readers. True enough, if the Iloilo airport is a nicer, albeit smaller, version of the Manila Centennial, so are the toilets. Nice, clean, well-serviced. But smaller. Only three johns and urinals, one for the disabled. But wow, airconditioning and no improvised carboards saying “Temporarily Not Working” and Whoa! they flush automatically. There’s actually a liquid soap dispenser on the washbowl (but no liquid soap. and no toilet paper)! And a fake orchid flower placement too!

At the risk of being hauled away as a paparazzi pervert, I managed to take a few shots of the toilet facilities, see for yourself. Of course, had to wait until no one was using them. (Ah my 2 loyal readers, the things I do for you!)

Luggage finally came rolling in, in bits and pieces. Changi may brag all she wants but the difference between their 8 minutes and our 12 is not much (that’s how long it took for our luggage to appear). The new luggage carts win a lot of points, though I did not get to use them as my luggage had wheels. Off to the exit then. The security guards do a valiant job of ripping luggage labels as overburdended passenger waits, careful that a slight odd movement might bring all those luggages down. People of the Philippines, next time, do these minimum wagers and the people behind you a favor by ripping the labels yourselves and attaching them to the tags on your ticket before you crowd into Mr. and Ms. Security, okay?

Finally, one thing that should not be missed out. The landscaping. The new airport is very well landscaped, but pretty as it is, this is also one of the most difficult and expensive areas to maintain. We hope the management can sustain that.

So there. It has been said many times, in negative reference to Manila’s, that an airport is the entrance to the city with which you welcome your guests. Iloilo wins and welcomes all with a new, clean, well-lit, well equippped airport that can do us prou. (Now if only they can do something about the traffic and the jeepneys.)

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Five days later, coming back to the Big City, I nearly missed my evening flight after misreading my e-ticket’s arrival time as my departure time. But the travel gods were on my side as checking in was a breeze. The departure hall and the counters were all within the general impression I had earlier.

Aircon Vents, Smoking Lounge and Bald Passenger

The clock. OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode)? Kewl. Our flight’s ETD was 19:25 and the fact that I was reading this sign meant something had gone wrong.

Like most modern airports, the departure lounge had those design elements that communicated a message of modernity: winged rooftops, high ceilings, industrial aircon vents, metal lounging chairs. Were it not for the fact that practically all new airports these days have the same design, it would have impressed me even more.

Which brings me to a close. As this city struggles its way to modernity with a spanking new airport as a potent symbol, this one, while it does impress and is worthy of its residents pride, needs to look for those elements that will distinguish it from all those others that are coming up with increasing regularity all over the world. We are certainly glad to see the old one go, but if it was to be a metaphor, we also worry for the small town feel of the city where we grew up in. In its rightful push towards progress, will it become another generic modern city that will lose its charm, all those things that we love and hate about Iloilo?