Now on board Philippine Airlines flights is the June 2009 issue of Mabuhay magazine, PAL’s Inflight Magazine. It was a pleasant surprise when I got a copy of the issue as the cover story entitled “Secrets of Mindoro” was my photography and writing assignment work for them on one of their destinations, San Jose, Mindoro. Too bad I didn’t get the cover for this one (cover by Jerome Bonto) but I’m still glad it got the main feature on this issue as I was expecting only to be one of the inside features. Also in this issue I got two more photos for Kota Kinabalu with writer John Oates. Checkout the editorial note and contributor’s feature to know more about the issue.
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Mindoro By Air
Now you can spend more time enjoying Mindoro rather than traveling long hours to get there. The good news is, PAL now has daily, direct flights (only 55 minutes) to San Jose, Mindoro, drastically cutting the trave time of the old route (at least three hours) that required a land trip to Batangas and from there, a ferry ride. Just to entice you to avail of this travel convenience, we have Mindoro on our cover and our main feature – appropriately titled “Secrets of Mindoro” (page 46) – by our contributor, Ferdz Decena, reveals the many, relatively unknown attractions of the island. So if you have only been to Mindoro’s most popular attraction, Puerto Galera, read through Ferdz’s well-written feature where he provides a list of interesting places and useful contact details.
The venue of Manny Pacquiao’s latest victory – Las Vegas – is our featured foreign destination. Our writer, Gary Singh, reports in his piece, “Retro Vegas” (page 26), that a formerly sleazy area in Vegas has been magically transformed into the retro-themed Fermont East District. Only in Las Vegas are investors like gamblers who put huge amounts on this entertainment capital’s future. By the way, now is also a good time during this financial crisis to scout for bargains in Vegas (surff the website: www.visitlasvegas.com)
Now back to our country’s hero Manny Pacquiao. His fight was held at MGM Grand Garden Arena and all 14,000 seats were sold out, grossing US$9 million bucks. In the casinos, seats went as much as US$50 for close circuit TV. Pacquiao has reached international celebrity status. Imagine, he has made it in Time magazine’s “100 most Influential People” sharing the limelight with the likes of U.S. President Obama. French President Sarkozy, and Tiger Woods. In Time magazine’s write up, his influence is described as similar to Nelson Mandela’s, and the writer Lennox Lewi (a former world heavyweight champion) went as far as predicting that he “can surely see Manny becoming the Philippine president one day.” His victory motorcade in the streets of Metro Manila was not only mentioned by CNN but was even covered by a CNN crew who rode with him in the motorcade. A new staffer who recently who recently joined us is last year’s Miss Cebu, Sian Maynard. Sian’s father, David, is a British furniture designer based in Cebu, who, of course, watched the fight between Filipino Manny Pacquiao and British Ricky Hatton. Guess who David Maynard voted for? Our very own Manny Pacquiao.
Simon S. Ventura, Jr.
Editor-in-chief
Hope the editorial note got you curious on this issue. So if you are flying Philippine Airlines tis June check out Mabuhay. If you like the features, be sure to tell them. 🙂
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