Can one truly ‘love’ the Philippines?

Getting a lot of hate: The video was launched as a part of the new ‘Love the Philippines’ tourism campaign. — CEBU PROVINCIAL TOURISM OFFICE/Facebook

I THOUGHT to myself ‘It looks like an Indonesian scenery,’” remarked Indonesian tourism and creative economy minister Sandiaga Uno in a recent interview, referring to a curious scene in the beta version of the “Love the Philippines” campaign video.

“That’s purely an unintentional mistake because to err is human. We don’t need to react too emotionally,” the Indonesian minister added with a touch of diplomatic niceties, referring to the scenes of Ubud, Bali, featured among a whole host of “stock videos” in the controversial promotional video.