OpinionsThe Way It IsA shoal by any other name...

A shoal by any other name…

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As far as I know, the Manjuyod Sandbar is the only such shoal in Negros Oriental.

It has become one of the prime tourist destinations in the Province, and is visited by foreign and domestic tourists. It is not exactly known when this shoal formed, but today it is advertised as a must-see attraction in the town of Manjuyod or in the city of Bais, depending on where you depart from.

Looking at a map, though, it is closer to Manjuyod by about three-tenths of a kilometer, shore edge to shore edge.

I had been to this Sandbar years ago, back when those cottages on stilts were newer and looked much better. I remember we took a small water tank with us to quench the thirst of about 25 people. A priest-friend, who was assigned in Manjuyod at that time, pledged one lechon, and I pledged the alcoholic drinks–as much as may be consumed. We were younger back then, so not having enough to drink would have been a major problem.

We started out to the shoal in the morning, not too early, but early enough, and stayed the night. That evening was one of the most memorable I’ve ever had at sea. I had spent many a night at sea in the Navy, but the darkness that surrounded us that evening at the Sandbar in Manjuyod was one that was different–balmy, peaceful, the silence punctuated by boisterous conversation and alcohol-induced laughter.

Looking around from the veranda of our stilt cottage, I felt a sense of isolation, of being so far away from the world, like being ship-wrecked on some far away island without a chance of being rescued.

I thought that for the time that we spent there, we could have done anything, and no one would be the wiser.

That’s the feeling a person is supposed to be imbued with when on a vacation to a place like the Sandbar.

When the tide was low, it was as if the kids were playing on an island with nothing but white sand around them. This was also the time when the sea gave up some of its creatures like the little crabs and starfish. Don’t worry, we didn’t take them. We let them be. We brought plenty of food. I guess the little critters were glad it was us.

Some people call this sandbar the Maldives of the Philippines, and while I have not been to the Maldives, I have been to Thailand that has similar shoals which are just as breathtakingly-beautiful as perhaps the Maldives.

For me, a beautiful place is one thing, but a beautiful vacation spot is entirely different.

The Manjuyod Sandbar is supposed to be like the latter. It is a place that you don’t go to just to look at it, and then leave. When you spend the time to go there, you’d want to stay a while, to experience its magic, to feel like you’re lost in a faraway land, unreachable, to shed the stresses of the real world.

You’d want to be drenched in sunlight while being caressed by the salty air, in a seemingly-forbidding sea. It would be an opportunity to experience isolation without having to be isolated.

Very seldom will you find vacation spots like that. But now that you know of the Manjuyod Sandbar, should you pass up the chance? I think not. You owe yourself at least one visit.

While it would be easy to describe it as jaw-droppingly beautiful, I am wary today about reassuring would-be visitors that they would be awed by it, and get that feeling of isolation that I experienced.

I would not have said this 10 or 15 years ago, but today, seeing that the spot is invaded by peddler boats during the day, the only isolation you’d feel would be during the balmy nights when those boat operators and peddlers are asleep.

But that would be entirely different if they weren’t there during the day, too, like you were alone on an island in the middle of the sea, free to gallivant and frolic without a care in the world. That kind of experience would be priceless, and would bring back the allure of the Manjuyod Sandbar.

I think that those peddler boats should be banned from anchoring out at the Sandbar because they destroy its tranquility.

I don’t really know who is responsible for its management. I may only guess that it should be the municipality of Manjuyod since the shoal branches out from its shores. Suffice it to say that whoever it is, must understand what attracts vacationers to it.

Everyone knows the people in those pumpboats are making a living, but I don’t think banning them on the waters around the Sandbar would take away their livelihood. They can always sell to the visitors at the jump-off points or sell right on the Sandbar.

For vacationers themselves, that would be a good time to stock up on supplies, anyway.

If it were me vacationing at the Sandbar, I wouldn’t want peddlers gawking at me all day, trying to sell me something, anything.

As for it being the Maldives of the Philippines, compare pictures of the Manjuyod Sandbar with that of the Maldives. I hope it would help bring forth my point. There really is no comparison.

If the Maldives were to be made bare again, the Manjuyod Sandbar may have a little semblance of it, but because it is much smaller, the visual similarity would not go far nor last long.

As it is, the Maldives is lightyears more developed as a vacation destination.

You’ll know when a place is beyond-words beautiful because as you stand back to look at it, it would look unreal, like a painting, a vision you could almost touch infront of you.

A good example would be the Grand Canyon in Arizona or the Yosemite National Park in the Sierra Nevada mountains in California that are just so impossibly naturally beautiful, you could hardly believe your eyes. Even with their natural beauty, still they are developed so humans may conveniently enjoy them.

The Manjuyod Sandbar has the potential to become a truly-beautiful tourist spot. It is up to the local government of Manjuyod to spend some money to make it so.

However, if they are satisfied the place now attracts visitors, and that’s good enough for them, it won’t be our place to say they’re wrong. They must realize, though, that it is visited because it is advertised deceivingly.

Would eight out of 10 visitors recommend it to others? Would those who have visited it already want to visit it again and again? I wouldn’t visit it again because there’s nothing different from before, except that those cottages have seen better times.

But I would when it is developed, and finally made easily accessible, and when those pesky pumpboats no longer anchor there all day.

Because it doesn’t really possess enough natural beauty to attract visitors on that merit alone, something must be done with it to make it stand out.

True, we don’t have sandbars all over the place, but that doesn’t mean that the Manjuyod Sandbar does not have to be developed. And maintained. And improved. An investment in a small pier and dedicated ferries would be reasonable. In fact, it would probably be the most important aspect in its development.

There is a lot of money to be made in tourism that some countries rely on it heavily, and feel every increase and decline in tourist visits. Some have economies that are kept afloat by tourism. They are others who have invested heavily in tourism programs, mostly because they have realized they owe it to the tourists to keep their tourist spots beautiful, accessible, and safe for all visitors.

It should be some sort of a quid pro quo–you make it worth our while, and we’ll come spend our money there.

If the Manjuyod Sandbar remains the way it is, even us locals will get tired of it, and would probably prefer a man-made shoal resort, if one were made, that was developed and ready for all tourists to visit and enjoy.

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Author’s email: [email protected]

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