By Neny Regino
APART from the All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day devotions that all of us Filipinos observe, November is especially poignant for me as it brings memories of the devastation wrought by Super Typhoon Yolanda on that part of the Visayas where I trace my roots. On a trip to my home province following the November 8, 2013 Yolanda onslaught, I saw the extent of the destruction and in all my life it was the first time I came face to face with such loss. I lost so many childhood friends and relatives. Aside from the lives lost and destroyed, Yolanda also left many homeless and without any kind of livelihood.
My only brother lives in the family home in Tacloban. When the water came rushing in, he climbed up to the ceiling. Later, when it seemed the water was subsiding, he started to descend but was suddenly swept away by another strong current. He barely made it back to the alcove. He waited for about 5 hours more before he could finally come down.
Needless to say, we lost everything. The roof was intact though and the sturdy windows were in place. Even the lock of our main door survived. But books, the souvenirs of my travels, my mother’s precious china, photos, furniture were tossed about. The house and garden were a mess, cars were overturned, floating debris was everywhere, bloated bodies in every street. Miraculously the mabolo trees were left standing; they bore the brunt of the surging waters, branches twisted and leaves blown away so that what entered our house were not as deadly.
When we were young, my siblings and I detested those mabolo trees with their unappetizing fruits. But they provided shade during the summer months, and the breeze from the abundant leaves gave us relief from the heat. So the trees were left to flourish in our front yard.
Now, I cherish the mabolo trees, feeling guilty that I disliked the trees in my youth. Now I have learned the importance of trees–from purifying the air, flood mitigation, combating climate change, among others.
Because we had no way of knowing if my brother had survived, my son and his wife flew to Leyte with one of the mercy missions of the SM Foundation. They were able to hitch a ride to the city from the airport but had to walk several kilometers more to get to our house. By the time they got to our home, half of the goods that they had brought for my brother had been given away to people along the way, many of whom were hungry and lost.
It was sheer relief for us when he opened the gate to our house at sunset. He set up the small generator (donated by the head of the Foundation), sharing it with two of our neighbors. They could manage to get it going for only three hours as that was all the fuel he could buy.
I traveled to Leyte for the Foundation to assess the situation of our scholars. We lost a scholar but we offered the program to his surviving sibling.
Many students found themselves without the means to continue their schooling; some had lost parents and family members; many were left without any source of income.
The Foundation immediately boosted its college scholarship program by opening up more slots, four times more than its regional allocation. With only five of us in the team, we were multi-tasking, we had to conduct interviews and examinations in five shifts per day to accommodate all applicants.
Many private individuals offered to finance scholarships through the Foundation.
The Foundation’s scholars recruited from the Eastern Visayas at that time were called “Yolanda scholars.” They have since graduated and are now employed. One of them, Lady Alpha Mae A. Fermano, obtained a bachelor’s degree in secondary education from the Leyte Normal University. She is now a senior high school instructor. Her studies were financed by Oscar Penaranda, a vacationing balikbayan from Barugo, Leyte, who responded immediately to our call for sponsors. Lady Alpha is doing her share of giving back by helping many of her students who are in dire need of books & supplies, sometimes even their transportation or food needs. Another scholar, Hubert Jason Tado Matrido graduated from Leyte Normal University. His studies were funded by Howard & Grace Sorensen, the latter works with the World Bank.
There were many others sponsored by private individuals.
After the visit, I came to realize that true courage shows itself when we open our hearts to persons we do not even know, nor like.
Relief trucks of Foundations and private companies coming from Cebu travelling to Tacloban via Ormoc had to make several stops to distribute relief goods to almost all the municipalities likewise affected by the typhoon. By the time they reached Tacloban, the trucks were half full so they had to travel back to Ormoc Pier to replenish relief goods.
Ten years after Yolanda, the Visayas are rising from the devastation. Its progress, though not as fast as we would want, is very much evident. Progress, the German poet Goethe said, “does not follow a straight ascending line, but a spiral with rhythms of progress and retrogression, of evolution and dissolution.”
***
(Please send your comments to nenyregino@yahoo.com or at living.malayabusinessinsight@gmail.com)
