Bright times ahead?

Take a look at what’s happening. They are indications of clearer skies. The gambit of our President to support America’s war against terrorism and its war against Iraq, despite howls of protest from local street parliamentarians and global resistance, is in all indications, paying off.

If the present scheme of things, as observed in GMA’s state visit to the US, does not take on a dramatic change, we’ll be sending a lot of workers to help in the reconstruction of Iraq–meaning more remittances, meaning more purchases by families of our OFWs, meaning a revitalized economy.

This could also mean that if you have been eyeing a certain property to buy and have just been waiting for that time when the price would be lowest–this may be it. Or maybe you have been waiting for a certain club membership to reach rock-bottom price before you bite, this could be the right time to grab it before it starts going up again.

And more importantly, and most probably to the chagrin of many politicians in the opposition, this could mean a change of heart for Ate Glo. What with the exceptionally warm welcome afforded by no less the President of the richest and mightiest country in the planet, who would logically opt for the continued established super close relationship between the two countries. A change of heart can only mean she’ll be doing it for our beloved Mother Country.

As I said, that declaration of not running for the highest position was a stroke of genius, a win-win situation. And is she winning!

A matter of survival

Do you realize that our hotel rates are relatively higher than those of the other countries in the region? We are more expensive to the point that long before the "SARS travel scare" some Pinoys would rather just go to some countries in the Asean region for their sojourns or vacations than see local tourist sites. This is simply because at the end of the day, they could wind up spending just a little more, or just as much, or if luckier, even spend less and still have the distinction of having traveled abroad.

This is exactly the situation many golf-playing Japanese presently find themselves in. Playing golf in the ‘Land of the Rising Sun’ is so expensive that many Japanese find it a lot cheaper to fly to the Philippines for a two-night stay to enjoy three days of playing golf. To some, the two wild nights at some Karaoke bar stand to be the bonus.

After having said this, I could almost hear the loud howls coming from the hotel industry saying, "What’s this idiot talking about? With the present situation, we are already losing money and he still wants us to lower our rates?"

Well, to begin with, I know that with the present adverse scenario–SARS travel threat, kidnappings, bombings and all, causing a tailspin for the hospitality industry, which includes among many, airlines, hotels and restaurants, there is cut-throat pricing going on. Without changing published rates, there is fierce fighting for the almighty dollar of the inbound traveler. A pricing war that’s only known among the marketers.

But how about the domestic travelers? Do they know of the present "fire sale’ pricing? Does it also apply to the locals? It seems that, as always, the local tourist or traveler has again been taken for granted. We have not learned our lesson about not having first built a strong and well established local tourism industry before venturing to cross the seas and aggressively and expensively promote our country.

We should have already known by now that it is a well-founded local tourism that should serve as the backbone of any country’s total tourism industry. It is in the process of building one’s local tourism industry that the country and its populace get to learn the rudiments of the game, setting everybody up for the big time when the floodgates for foreign travelers would be finally opened wide.

And besides, it is when times like these do really come, when foreign travel is lowest, when there’s always the local market to lean on. And it may not be this bad if we had only really fully developed first our local tourism industry.

But then again, how can we promote local travel and tourism when it’s more expensive for Pinoys to see their own homeland? When our hotels have higher rates that those of our neighboring countries?

Maybe it’s time we take a second look at our market studies and strategies. Have we thought of considering volume first over instant margins?

Think about it. It may mean our survival.

Sorry, the members don’t like any of you

The detractors of the present board of Valle Verde Country Club have again been proven wrong.

Despite all the information dissemination regarding the general membership meeting and the egging to all the members to attend, there was a measly group who came for the appointed date. Of course, most of the "measly group" were those who have been shouting loudest to have a complete change in the board.

To, hopefully, stimulate the membership to attend the meeting, some moron even came up with a "poison letter" with a litany of insanely conceived allegations against almost all the members of the board, but to no avail.

These detractors cannot seem to accept the fact that the membership has that level of intelligence that could not just be hoodwinked into anything they concoct just to get themselves elected to the board and achieve their only goal of having their names in brass tacked on the bulletin board.

It has always been the notion that when it is difficult to have a quorum in a club’s general membership meeting, despite attempts to inform and remind everybody about it, the most logical explanation is that the majority of the membership is satisfied with the way the club is being run.

Now when a group of detractors starts making noise against the present leadership and is not at all minded by the membership, the most logical explanation is that the group is looked upon as not worthy of attention, a pesky nuisance, if you may.

Sorry guys, you’ll have to wait for the nth time to prove yourselves right again. But the club members give you a "triple A" for the effort–although a futile and worthless one.

B&L will survive!

If you are one of those loyal viewers of the TV show Business & Leisure who have decided to make it your regular weekend nightcap and are presently in the dark as to what happened to this institution on Philippine television–worry not. It has found itself mired in some political quagmire, by no fault of its own, having been an apolitical show from the time it first went on the air 12 years ago.

All I can say is just to be patient, as the show has been always known as a survivor, being an alternative program promoting time-honored values with a profound goal of uplifting the viewing standards of the Filipino.

Mabuhay !!! Be proud to be a Filipino.

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