by Mynardo Macaraig
BUENAVISTA, Philippines, July 22 (AFP) - With eight children and a wife to care for, Angelo de La Cruz -- the Filipino hostage who returned home from Iraq Thursday -- found the prospect of higher-paid work overseas the best option.
Fifteen years ago the 46-year-old driver took a job in Saudi Arabia so he could sent much-needed money to his family back home, like the seven million Filipinos left with little choice but to seek a living overseas.
It was the promise of hefty bonuses that tempted De La Cruz to run the gauntlet driving fuel trucks over the border into Iraq -- a decision that nearly cost him his life.
On July 4, he was snatched by Islamic militants. After a 17-day hostage ordeal, he was released Tuesday after President Gloria Arroyo had complied with the captors' demands for a full withdrawal of Philippine troops from Iraq.
De La Cruz flew back home Thursday to an emotional family reunion, vowing never to return "to Iraq or any other Arab country", and to seek work again in his impoverished homeland.
But despite the euphoria surrounding his release in his home town of Buenavista, he may well end up where he started 15 years ago -- driving a bus and struggling to make ends meet.
"He was a driver before. I guess he will be a driver again," de la Cruz's brother, Bong de la Cruz, told AFP.
Buenavista is a sleepy rice-farming town a few hours' drive north of Manila. The road there is nothing more than a dirt track shared by water buffalo and lined by clusters of small houses cutting through the rice paddies.
Joey Ramos, a district official, estimates that of the 1,900 residents of Buenavista, almost five percent have gone abroad to work or have a relative who is already employed abroad. In surrounding villages the estimates are as high as 20 per cent.
He says that about two in five Buenavista residents live below the poverty line, in a country where more than half the 84-million population live on two dollars a day.
The average wage in Buenavista is about 125 pesos (2.2 dollars) a day, less than half the daily minimum in the Philippines, says Pineda.
"It's a hand-to-mouth existence," district chief Alfredo Pineda says.
In contrast, de la Cruz's relatives estimated he was earning 300 dollars a month.
De la Cruz said it was up to the more than 3,000 other Filipino civilian workers in Iraq if they wanted to stay or return home.
"What I can say is that Iraq is a dangerous place," he said.
He is due to return Friday to the comparative sanctuary of Buenavista, where his tiny bamboo-thatch home is festooned with banners to welcome him back.
The town has declared Friday a holiday. It is getting back to earning a decent living that is shaping up to be De La Cruz's next nightmare.