C O M PA S S
Hi! Please introduce yourself.
Don’t Skip Manila is a passion project that aims to create
awareness for the mostly misunderstood city.
We craft tours that tell the stories of Manila. With all the
reasons to skip this city full of chaos, traffic and poverty, we
tell travelers otherwise. DON’T SKIP MANILA.
BASECO Slum Tours. We are finalizing our Ermita Tour
and Sampaloc Tour. We are partnering with the trolleys of
PUP to create the Sta. Mesa Tour.
San Miguel has a peaceful vibe that feature the
old rich houses of Manila. The Sta. Ana Heritage District
makes it seem like you are not in Manila. Tondo has a food
street. There is so much more to explore and discover.
What’s the story behind Don’t Skip Manila?
What makes your tours different?
We (with co-founder Andre Julian) both studied tourism
in college, and as we read about Manila on the web, we often
came across recommendations to “skip” the city. So what
we did was to create a Facebook page that initially compiled
events that were happening here, and later on added tourist
attractions and destinations, that could entice people to not
skip Manila. Eventually, we ventured into creating tours.
We thought that people couldn‘t love Manila just by visiting,
they have to know the wheres, whys and whats of the city.
You can’t truly love a something that you don’t know, right?
What have people been saying about the experience?
Has anyone shared a particularly surprising insight of
how they had viewed Manila and how their perception
may have changed after the tours?
Even though the idea had been floating in our minds for
the last two years, we started just last December (2017) and the
reception has been great so far. We get to meet like-minded
people who share our love for culture and heritage, foreigners
who have been reading the ‘if you don’t have time, skip Manila’
statements on the internet, students who have been studying
here for the longest time but were unable to explore the city. It’s
satisfying to see how their perceptions change after the tours.
We had one guest who joined us in Pandacan and fell in
love the Ilog Beata (Estero de Pandacan). We hooked him up
with the local community, and now they are working hand
in hand to preserve the old beauty of the river.
When people talk of Manila as a travel destination,
we usually take them to places that show the capital’s
glorious past. But what of today? What do you think
makes Manila beautiful right now?
More than the places, it’s the stories of Manila that make
it beautiful. It’s the surviving and strong spirit of this city that
makes it unique.
Manila is a mirror of one’s soul. If you want to see the
traffic, then you get the traffic. If you want to see poverty,
you get poverty. If you want to see the bad, you get the
bad. BUT if you want to see art in Manila, you get art. If
you want to see culture, you get culture. If you want to see
sunset, you get the most beautiful sunset.
If our readers were to take your tours, how should they
prepare for it?
[Have] an open heart for the city. “Manila is a city that’s
very easy to judge and very hard to understand.” It takes an
open mind and heart to see beauty in this city.
Very few experiences in the city actively promote
sustainability as much as Don’t Skip Manila. At the
start of every month, you hold a Barter Week where
people can exchange Ecobricks for a tour. How
important is it for the experience industry to participate
in this kind of advocacy?
This was our reaction to the Pasig River Rehabilitation
Committee’s efforts to save the Pasig River. You see, it was the
Pasig River that created the city, and we destroyed the Pasig River.
We [the city as a whole] tried a lot of fundraising campaigns like
Piso Para sa Pasig. It's time for a new approach. PUSO PARA SA
PASIG. We try to engage people with conservation by promoting
the making and donation of ecobricks.
I love that you have a Pandacan tour. I live nearby
(Santa Mesa) and am familiar with many other parts
of the city that most people may not be. Escolta,
Intramuros and Quiapo are key to understanding
Philippine history, but Manila has more to offer. Are
you planning to include more neighborhoods in
your tours? Can you name others that you think are
underrated?
We are planning to create 16 tours inside Manila!
Manila as a whole is underrated. We partnered with Smokey
Tours to present the other side of Manila for our Port Area
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