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Treasure Island
From its teeming reefs to its hospitable people and—yes—delicious cuisine, Bohol is one of the Philippines’ best-kept secrets.
Now, this hinterland hopes to parlay its friendly shores into the next big thing. But should it?
On the drive to the Dauis Convento for a feast that was to be my introduction to Boholano cuisine, I found myself reining in my expectations. While the invitation to a lavish banquet at a 19th-century priory sounded enticing, the Filipino reputation for a coarse palate made me worry that the rendezvous might play out like a blind date at Jollibee.
The scene that greeted me melted my red-plastic-and-neon trepidations. A romantically moldering convent built of coral stone and molave hardwood rested in the shadow of the 146-year-old Señora de la Asuncíon church, and dinner was laid on white linen in a twilit courtyard beneath the branches of a massive acacia. My escort for the evening, a local historian named Marianito Jose Luspo, banished any remaining misgivings with an infectious rasp of laughter that caused his entire voluminous frame to quake. “Boholanos always offer our best plates and fanciest bedding to guests,” he assured me. “From childhood, we are told, ‘The best is reserved for visitors.’ ”
The Philippines is, by and large, a land of gracious hospitality. And as Marianito told it, Bohol is the country’s most amiable stop. “In other parts of the Philippines, if you show up at someone’s home at dinnertime, they won’t invite you to eat,” he explained. “In Bohol, we stop, we clear the plates in a hurry, and we pretend as if we haven’t started. That’s why houses must always have a back door, so that the smallest child can sneak out and run to borrow the fanciest food he can get. And when he returns, the family must insist that the food was ready and waiting.”
Story by Aaron Gulley Photographs by Jen Judge
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