Image: Instagram/@maui_manalo
After the Boracay shutdown last April 26, Labor Day weekenders headed for other beaches around the country. One popular destination was La Union, given it is just some hours away from Metro Manila.
At a San Juan beach, artists including Kiana Valenciano, Matteo Guidicelli and Carlo Aquino promoted a beach-cleanup and performed in a benefit gig, “One Paradise,” to raise awareness on keeping Philippine tourist spots pollution-free.
However, a video from Valenciano’s Instagram shows trash littered in the sand at the North Shore. With stray plastic cups and bottles throughout the beach, it seems some have still missed the message of looking after the environment.
“You guys, come on. Please pick up after yourselves; it’s not that hard,” Valenciano pleads in the video.
“Have we not learned from the mistakes we made in Boracay? Must we destroy every place we feel is paradise?” she wrote in the caption. “I strongly urge everyone to please PLEASE DO YOUR PART.”
“The amazing La Union community welcomes visitors with nothing but open arms and we treat their home this way. It’s not right,” she said.
“Take care of our beaches, our provinces, our country. Start the change you want to see.”
During the benefit concert, Guidicelli also called on beachgoers to keep the beach clean and called on members of the audience to throw their trash properly.
In September 2017, environmental group Greenpeace released a report that cited the Philippines as the “third-worst polluter into the world’s oceans,” in large part due to plastic waste. /ra
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