Coming back from a UNESCO conference in Bangkok, Thailand, my wife arrived at the Philippine Airlines Terminal at around 3:50 AM on November 25, 2012. My daughter and I picked her up from the PAL terminal, loaded her luggage in the car and drove back home.
Later on, we discovered that we had left two duty free plastic bags (which contained three name brand lady’s handbags) which were hanging at the back side of the luggage trolley. My wife was so distraught and unhappy because she had no time to go shopping and those were the only gifts she had the time to buy. We knew that the chances of retrieving those bags were practically nil, but hoping against hope and praying that God wills it, we rushed back to the airport. We got back there after about an hour from the time we left.
As we got near bay 14 which is where I picked up my wife earlier, we saw that there was an area (about 5 square meters) which was cordoned off by a yellow tape ribbon and there was a female security guard beside the cordoned off area. In the middle was an empty luggage trolley with 2 transparent duty free plastic bags hanging at the backside. The Head security guard was called and after checking my wife’s passport and ticket and after finding that her name was on the credit card receipt for the items inside the duty free plastic bags, he released the items to us. No one asked for anything from us and they were not waiting for any gratuity. I thanked them profusely and we left.
The name of the head guard at the PAL terminal was Jonathan Javier (IPT – T2). I have written this narrative with the hope that it will serve as an inspiration to all our Filipino countrymen that there are people in our country who are honest and do their duty. I believe that if we pray hard and if God wills it, our country can and will become a progressive and happy nation. It is my hope that this short narrative finds its way to the attention of PAL management and I hope they give those guards the recognition and applause they so richly deserve.