by Elpidio R. Estioko
People I know kept asking me how beautiful, exotic, and enjoyable, and what makes Boracay the 5th Best island in Asia, according to the Destin Asian Magazine’s 17th Annual Reader’s Choice Awards 2024.
I didn’t know what to answer until my wife’s siblings and relatives and I visited Boracay last week in a seven-day tour of Panay Island for the first time.
I am already in my prime age, but that was the only time I had the chance to visit the famed tourist spots.
As a prelude to the Boracay trip, we drove to Iloilo City from our hotel room in Altavas, Aklan, and visited the parks, the old churches, the market place and other landmarks of Iloilo.
It has been a long time too since I visited the city during the Masagana 99 National Rice Program days.
I was then working with the Department of Agriculture as one of three government counterparts that implemented the massive communications component of the most ambitious rice program of the country with J. Walter Thompson who won the communications component when Guimaras was still a sub-province of Iloilo.
Now Guimaras is a separate thriving province with the island’s famous mangoes.
The following day, we went to Roxas City, Capiz, where we experienced having lunch in a floating raft restaurant in the Palina River being towed by a boat (balsa) while enjoying eating crabs, oysters, fish, vegetables, and other seafood served by the local chef.
That was my first experience, in fact, most of the group’s first experience of the floating restaurant circling the Palina River with mangroves on the side of the river serving as safe places when the storm is strong and the winds are strong with the mangroves serving as a safe place to stop.
The river trip usually takes an hour but we had it only for 30 minutes because of strong winds that forced us to go to a safe mangrove area before resuming the cruise. It was raining at that time.
We were introduced to this kind of thrilling experience by my niece Rhoda Estioko (she was also vacationing in the Philippines from the US) with two of the staff of her brother-in-law’s beach resort in Capiz Romy Villar.
Towards the end of our Panay tour, we finally visited Boracay and scoured the place for three days.
The two-hour drive from our hotel in Altavas, Aklan to Boracay gave me a chance to talk to seaman Tottie Doroteo and discuss seafarers’ life in the sea. We were both passengers at the back with our SUV being driven by Ghaga Ventura with my wife Delia in the front seat.
The other 14-seater car with our group (my wife’s siblings and relatives) were trailing us: Roger Ventura, his wife Bot and their daughter Carol; Nelia Ventura Samar and her daughter Bekbek Reyes with her children Ayon and Nehlay; Nelia Ventura; Editha Ventura Azucenas; Rene Ventura; Ligaya Ventura Doroteo; and Fiona Ventura.
Tottie’s ship is owned by a Japanese company and has been employed with the cargo ship for many years now. He is a veteran seafarer! I learned that his ship is composed of the ship’s captain, 7 other officers plus 13 crewmembers for a total of 21. They have individual rooms but common toilets. Only the officers have their toilets in their rooms.
Most of the time, they have mixed crews but are mostly dominated by Filipinos who are hard-working, compared to other nationalities. That’s the reason the ship owners and the captain prefer Filipinos as crewmembers.
Salaries/wages range from $800 to $1,500 depending on their roles in the ship. When their contract is ended (usually from 6 to 9 months), they are given a $100 leave fee in addition to their monthly salaries. Then, they have to wait for a month to three months to be able to be hired again.
They have a fixed amount of allotment being sent to their spouse depending upon their agreement from $330-$800. Most of the crew members send allotments of $300 to $500 while officers send $800 as allotments.
They don’t spend, at all, their own money throughout the duration of their contract because they have free board and lodging and nothing to spend on while at sea.
One important thing is they contribute $50 to $80 as part of their benefit thrust which they can withdraw when they need it.
Most seamen have it accumulated and when they need money they can withdraw and even make a bigger loan when they need money. That’s the reason why most seamen have big houses and have a lot of appliances.
After a two-hour drive taking the less traveled shortcut at the edge of the mountains, we reached Caticlan, a progressive barangay of Boracay where the newly built Caticlan airport was.
At Caticlan, we have to register to go to Boracay and pay immigration and boat fare for a 10-minute trip to Boracay Island.
The Boracay Sun, Boracay’s monthly newspaper, reported in its May 2024 issue that Boracay Island and its beaches have received notable awards from numerous travel organizations and agencies since 2011.
These contributions brought honor to the Philippines, also referred to as the “Pearl of the Orient Seas.”
On a daily basis, for three days, we left our hotel in Boracay and showered the blessings of the Boracay beaches, even if it was raining.
We saw the sun in the afternoon of the second day and the whole day on the third day and enjoyed the pristine-calm waters, the gentle waves, the ambiance of nature, the sun, and the multitude of stores serving the tourists coming from all walk of lives in all parts of the world.
They, like us, came to Boracay to commune with nature and have a positive confirmation of what the visitors, tourists, journalists, media men, reviewers, businessmen, and critics are saying: Boracay Island Ranks the 5th best island in Asia.
ELPIDIO R. ESTIOKO was a veteran journalist in the Philippines and an award-winning journalist here in the US. He just published his book Unlocking the chain of Poverty: In Pursuit of the American Dream which is now available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Xlibris Publishing. For feedbacks, comments… please email author at estiokoelpidio@gmail.com.
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