The ballad of El Nido

El Nido

 

Looking back on it I realise how fortunate we were, and how lucky we were to land on our feet. El Nido could easily have been the place we turned up to, stayed in a flea infested shoe box, done a boat cruise, no less overwhelmed by the underwhelming experience of it all. Such was not the case. We found the closest thing to paradise I have ever found, and I felt the greatest sense of inner calm I have for some time.

 

That was our story of El Nido.

 

But there is another story going on.

 

This the story of villagers who grow up to become waitresses, of fishermen who grow up to become tour guides, of children who grow up to sell post cards and tacky necklaces, of shop fronts who replace rice and bananas with postcard-perfect tours and price tags.

 

El Nido, as yet untouched by the mass of tourists - and struggling under the weight of the existing tourists - retains a beauty, a charm, and independence that is hard to find in South East Asia.

 

Now, as Lonely Planet's No.1 thing to do in the Philipines - such is the power of this medium - it will swell and change into a beast to serve the tourist dollar, not the kids playing basketball or mothers cooking chicken over charcoaled barbeques in the evening sun. Yes, tourists will bring dollars and jobs, not previously tapped, and with that more guest houses will spring up, shops will modernise, roads will be paved, restaurants will start selling cheeseburgers as well as meat on a stick, and the winds of change will sweep through the village.  

 

And how do I place my experience of El Nido with that of the unstoppable tourist wave? After all, I am a tourist. I too snap photos of lagoons and beachfronts, eat in restaurants and drink at pubs. I, whether consciously or not, am there to consume - whatever form that may take. And it is for the beauty of the place and the consumption within that people come to this place. Is it only for the chosen few, such that it retains it's charm for the few who do go there?

 

This conflict can never be resolved. Towns change, evolve, as do people, sometimes leaving behind nothing of what once was.

 

Let us hope the Ballad of El Nido is a happy one, one that let's change happen for the better. Let us hope that the growing pains that inevitably come are kept to a minimum, so that one day that town that gave Derek, Josie, Dan, and us such a wonderful few days will do the same for others - both local and international.

 

We can only hope.