The Wrath of (Mayor Fred) Lim

my good kabalen, spanky, posted his blog in one of our email groups about the news item on newly elected Manila Mayor Lim wanting to remove all establishments along the baywalk area.

true to his word, Mayor Lim aka Dirty Harry took down all of the bars located along the stretch of the baywalk area, which were enjoying good business during the term of former Mayor Atienza.

yesteday morning, after i dropped off my wife at the US embassy for her interview, i drove down the boulevard on my way to cavite. as i was driving, i remembered my friend's post and decided to take pictures of the now empty baywalk. using my nokia N70 and using the 'sport' setting, i took some pictures as i was driving by.

here are the pictures that i took:




now, if they took down the fake hanging shark and the dinosaurs, how come the giant coffee cup of cafe puro hasn't been torn down yet? same goes for the coffee/snack bar at the end of the baywalk towards the manila yacht club.

when i used to work at the manila hotel, i knew how terrible traffic was along the boulevard, especially on saturdays when bro. mike velarde and his "fan club" would hold their prayer meetings at the quirino grandstand. it's good that they've moved their gathering to the land owned by bro. mike along sucat road, not far from sm sucat. the baywalk then was dark and you would think twice if you wanted to take sunset or early evening stroll.

when former Mayor Atienza allowed bars to be set up along the baywalk, the place came alive. lots of people suddenly appreciated the area at night. the place lit up. as a hotelier, i too learned to appreciate the idea of using the baywalk as an entertainment area. it attracted both local and foreign tourists to the area. it was a place to be for some beers and stories among friends.

Mayor Lim said that it wasn't political, he was just implementing the law. we don't know the 'real' reason behind the demolition but we hope that they would reconsider what they did.