| NO HOLDS BARRED |
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| Armida Siguion-Reyna |
01/03/2012
The word is Tagalog slang for sloppy work or performance, says an online dictionary under bansa.org. That the first three letters collectively make the acronym for Philippine Airlines isn’t mere coincidence. Palpak is, and palpak will be, there’s no other airline now palpak-er than PAL.
Time was when the family would not go anywhere, unless on PAL. My husband Sig was lawyer for the company, and he took such great pride in it, we flew PAL to wherever, whenever there was traveling to be done, whether for business or pleasure. There were free trips and discounts, but we paid for the most part. In those days you never presumed the freebies were for the asking, so came the day when Sig was no longer lawyering for them, we continued to patronize PAL and kept track of friends we’d made in PAL, like Pat Waln in Los Angeles and Nardoni in Italy, whose first name I forget, but whose face I still see in my head.
It was still pretty much PAL for us, when we first hit the international film festival circuit. We’d go PAL to California, then take a connecting flight to Toronto, finish the festival then go to New York for some R & R, then it’d be back to California, where PAL waited like an old friend to bring us home. Exactly when the old friend misbehaved I cannot pinpoint. It first started as what I felt was loose talk, from left and right of my friendship circle, “Naku, Tita Midz, huwag ka nang lumipad ng PAL, pagkasama-sama na nang serbisyo.”
By then, I was getting along in years, and had started to travel skipping the US West Coast and going to the New York, via Japan, on Northwest, or via Hong Kong, on Cathay Pacific. News of how badly PAL was faring with its labor force had started to spread. There were lesser and lesser flights, none anymore to Europe, and only to California, Australia and Asia. Talk was rife, binababoy na ng mga pasahero ang PAL, hindi na iginagalang, dahil pakiramdam ng mga sumasakay, sila rin naman, hindi iginagalang ng airline that never took off on schedule, served terribly awful food, and on top of everything continued to use aircraft that should have long been retired, with toilets that clog and doors that won’t close and seats that don’t lean back.
But good memories of the national flag carrier refused to die easily, despite hits-and-misses of flying time schedules. Sig, until he passed, would still OK family holiday trips to Bangkok and Hong Kong and approve the law office’s flights to California on PAL. So when PAL agreed to partially sponsor Aawitan Kita sa Amerika last April-May in 2011 and for programs carrying their logo and live voice-over announcement gave us a free round-trip business ticket for me and hefty tawad for all others on coach, we really felt we deserved it.
Going to San Francisco, my seat wouldn’t lean back, my seatbelt wouldn’t buckle, I took the longest time in the comfort room because first I had to clean the place up; it was only one of two things, the attendants were not doing their job, or my fellow passengers in the business section were all pigs — or both. The attendants, because of PAL’s unfair labor practices, and the passengers, because ‘yun na nga, ayaw na nilang igalang ang airline na hindi rin nagpapakita nang paggalang sa kanila.
Going home, I knew better: I took a sleeping pill. Deplaning, though, at the Centennial Airport, there was only one carousel at work, servicing the three incoming flights, naghalo ang balat sa tinalupan — literally.
I had wanted to write about that bum experience even then, but my companions prevailed on me, kesyo nakakahiya raw at libre ang ticket ko. When we flew to Australia two months ago in November, my production staff tried to avail of PAL sponsorship anew, but didn’t get it. Memories of the bad trip still rankled, yet I couldn’t write about it, lest I appeared critical for not getting a free ticket. I decided to bide my time, to criticize PAL, only on airfare I had paid for.
Then I flew to Hong Kong with family last Dec. 27. I’d previously fractured my left shoulder, and was wearing a sling. Like all who are in pain, I was meek as a lamb, hitsurang di talaga makabasag-pinggan, as I did not want to wreak havoc on my family’s vacation by behaving like a brat.
In HK, I mostly used the wheel chair. Shopping and getting in and out of vehicles was a tad harder, but I took it all in stride, as I’d been warned by my doctors not to strain my body, less it took longer for my fracture to heal. There was some (bearable) pain, I managed to bid the old year goodbye and welcome the new one in.
Going home, everything went downhill. The PAL flight that was supposed to leave at 9:45 p.m., left at 11 p.m. Never mind that, as after all, it’s said that a PAL experience is not a PAL experience if it’s on time. Airborne, a child cried from take-off to touch down, with parents that didn’t know how to calm the kid down, and attendants that likewise didn’t know squat. Again, never mind that, for a child that’s in pain, is a child that’s in pain, and cannot be manhandled.
First in, on business class, I was first out. The wheelchair attendant was waiting for me, with a wheelchair, but he couldn’t take me out to immigration, “Kasi ho, may dalawa pang naka-wheelchair dapat sa loob, at bawal na ho sa amin ang magtulak ng isang naka-wheelchair lang. Nagbawas ho ang PAL ng mga empleyado sa level namin, ang trabaho ng dalawa, pinagagawa ho sa isa.”
“Kahit posibleng maaksidente ang isa sa dalawang itutulak mo?” I asked, incredulous.
“Gano’n na nga ho,” he answered.
I protested, the attendant wouldn’t listen to me, he kept on repeating he had to follow instructions strictly or he’d lose his job. I threatened to write about what he was doing to me, he politely shot back, “Sige ho, isulat n’yo na ho, at ipagbigay alam sa marami, dahil ang totoo’y nahihirapan na rin kami at kami ang inaaway ng pasahero.” It was only after one of my children talked to him that he dared bring me out, and the negotiation took a good half-hour.
Upset, I don’t remember how my children got our suitcases off the carousel and into carts. They had just barely calmed me down, when outside the airport building, there was a build-up of traffic, for cars were parked on the driveway by drivers whose masters had yet to go out of the building, but were clearly allowed by the airport security to double-park. I was able to take down two plate numbers, ZMR-807 and KKW-559, there were more cars similarly double-parked.
Is all truly lost for PAL?
(For comments, write to armida114@yahoo.com)
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