LINGAYEN–Not even a harrowing and life-threatening experience in trying to flee strife-torn Libya could discourage them from working abroad again.

Two overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) from Pangasinan, who have just come home from Libya after their work was disrupted by the fighting between protesters backed by renegade soldiers and forces loyal to Colonel Moammar Ghadaffi, are now eager to find a job again in another country.

Jimmy Villamil, 38, father of four, from Pantal, Dagupan City, said if there is an opportunity, he will readily apply for work abroad again, but not in Libya nor a country that is similarly experiencing unrest.

Villamil who worked in Benghazi City, Libya for 18 months as a surveyor aide of a Libyan Construction Company, said he arrived home with only his clothes on and a carry-on bag containing a few of his personal belonging.

He narrated that he escaped, along with fellow Filipinos, by taking a bus provided by their employer, HNC Labalen, to Egypt for a 13-hour ride without any food.

There were some 2,000 Filipinos in the work camp, he continued, and as there were only a few buses available, the vehicles had to travel back and forth every 16 hours.

FERRY RIDE

Another OFW, Alvin Sison, 32, who worked as a carpenter for Aquatic Marine Supply based in Tripoli, Libya, said he escaped from the country by taking a ferryboat that took them to Malta.

Five other Filipinos, he said, were with him in the nine-hour ferry ride to Malta where they took a flight back to the Philippines.

Sison, who has spent two and a half years in Libya, said they were 117 Filipinos working in the company but only six of them were on that trip to Malta.

“From our work place, we rode on a bus that took us up to the seaport, just 15 minutes away. But we were stranded there for a day,” he said.

Sison, who assessed that the fighting in Libya will be a protracted war, said he would not want to go back there but would take an opportunity to work abroad again in another country.

STILL IN LIBYA

Meanwhile, several Filipinos in Libya, estimated at a total of about 25,000, have chosen to remain there.

One of them is Lolita Martin-Paguio, a nurse in a Benghazi Hospital, who last week told her parents in Lingayen over the telephone that everything is alright for her and her husband, Romarico, who works in poultry farm also in Benghazi.

Paguio’s parents, Maxima and Julian Martin, both 89 years old, phoned Lolita in their Benghazi home last Thursday through a free call provided by the provincial government through its newly-opened OFW Desk and Crisis Center Hotline.

The Paguios have been working in Libya for 23 years, with regular visits to their home in Pangasinan.

Lolita assured her parents that they are safe and are carrying on with their work.

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