I spent last week as a guest of Qatar Airways on their inaugural flight from Doha to Cebu City. Cebu is now their 48th destination. A group of 11 Gulf-based journalists were flown in to savor the beauty and legendary friendliness of Cebuanos, and we were not disappointed.

Flying with me from Jeddah was the wife of Philippine Ambassador to the Kingdom Bahnarim Guinomla and her two sons, Omar and Hashim. The ambassador was originally scheduled to travel with us, but was ordered by the late Foreign Affairs Secretary Blas Ople to stay in Saudi in preparation for President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s state visit to Bahrain on Dec. 15.

Qatar Airways is aiming to tap into the large population of Filipinos in the Gulf who come from the Visayas and Mindanao regions by offering them a direct flight to Cebu, allowing them to bypass the congestion of Manila. Although our return flight from Cebu was empty, an airline employee assured me that the flights just before Christmas were absolutely sold out.

Before landing in Cebu on Dec. 11 we had a short stopover in Singapore, where our plane and delegation were received by a Singaporean civil aviation officials and a Chinese dragon dance. This was also Qatar Airway’s inaugural flight to Singapore. When we finally arrived in Cebu, after 18 hours of travel from Jeddah, the smiles that greeted us helped us feel a tiny bit better, though tiredness and jet lag made most of us want to fall into our hotel beds right away!

Tourism Secretary Richard Gordon and Cebu Gov. Pablo Garcia were on hand to officially receive us, both making clever references to the original Muslim inhabitants of Cebu when Magellan landed in the area in the 16th century.

Arriving at our first hotel, the Cebu Marriott, I realized I needed to change some money in order to buy a top-up Globe card to get my Globe SIM card to work. The hotel’s exchange rate for the dollar was of course terrible, 52 pesos to the dollar. The front desk employee agreed with me that I could get a much better rate outside the hotel and suggested I run over to the Ayala Shopping Center right next door. I did just that, passing lovely Christmas lanterns that were colorfully glowing on the lawn outside the mall. I changed some dollars for a much better rate of 55.45 pesos to the dollar.

The next day we had a whirlwind tour of Cebu City, visiting Magellan’s Cross and the Santo Nino Church, once the oldest church in the Philippines. I say once because our guide told us that since it burnt down three times since the Spanish originally built it, the San Agustin Church in Intramuros, Manila, is now considered the oldest surviving church in the Philippines.

We also met Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmena at City Hall, where he talked to us about the city’s never-ending efforts to attract more tourists and business investors. The old rivalry between the country’s oldest city and Manila is legendary, and was made clear to us when Osmena claimed that many call-centers were relocating to Cebu from Manila because Cebuanos allegedly speak better English than Manilenos. This, he explained, was because Cebuanos have difficulty in learning the national language of Tagalog, and instead focus their attention on learning English.

The next day, Saturday, we took the Super Cat ferry to Bohol, a mere one and half hours away. Once there we proceeded to the Chocolate Hills in Carmen town. A natural formation of around 1,200 hills in a single plateau around 350 meters above sea level, the hills are covered in grass which turns brown in the heat of summer, thus explaining where they got their name from. No can explain why so many hills appeared in such a small area, but according to one legend they are the solidified tears of giant who once roamed the area.

Along the way we stopped at a roadside stall to look at the world-famous tarsier, which is the world’s smallest primate. Originally thought to be monkeys, they were later reclassified as primates, being older than monkeys. Only around five inches in length, these tiny creatures have furry bodies and giant eyes. Nocturnal creatures, tarsiers sleep during the day while clinging to tree branches. Extremely shy and solitary, tarsiers are an endangered species protected by law and their export is prohibited.

Our day was capped with a riverboat lunch and cruise on the Loboc River. While we were gently pushed downstream, musicians serenaded us with love songs as we ate our lunch of grilled chicken, fish and shrimp with white rice. We sipped buko juice and drank in the lush vegetation that covered the banks of the river on both sides.

Our last day in Cebu was spent at the luxurious Shangri-La Mactan Island Resort, a 600-room hotel that sprawls over beautiful grounds. With its own small beach, this resort is definitely five stars and not for those of more modest means. At around $200 a night for the cheapest room, the resort was overflowing with young Korean tourists, whom everyone told us have overtaken the Japanese at the number one foreign tourists in Cebu.

At the airport, when we were leaving, I stocked up on dried mangoes, peanut kisses and dried fish, which I brought back as “pasalubong”. Although some of the journalists in our group had complained about the poverty and dirtiness of the streets, I think Cebu and Bohol managed to work their charm on all of us, leaving happy memories and a hope of someday returning.

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