I'm A Yolanda Survivor: Honoring The Resilience Of The Past

8 November 2024

The 8th of November marked a significant event in the Philippine history. It may not be a good history to recollect, but it would leave devastating memories of the past in people's minds, especially survivors like me. It was the day when one of the deadliest tropical cyclones wreaked havoc in many provinces in our country and took thousands of lives and millions worth of resources. It was when super Typhoon Yolanda, also called "Typhoon Haiyan" left unmaskable scars in our lives.

Today, the 8th of November, is a non-working holiday in our province to commemorate the havoc and resilience that happened eleven years ago. I honor those who died and survived the super typhoon Yolanda, and I hope that all lost souls have already found their respective places.

Remembering The Havoc of the Past

More than a decade has passed, but the memories are still vivid in my mind. I still remember the first rainfall when the storm landed, which we thought was just the same as other cyclones. However, as time passed, the wind got stronger and deafening, which made the situation intense and caused great turmoil within the community.

I still remember we were preparing things to put in a higher place to prepare for unexpected situations while monitoring the river water level. When all of a sudden, the river water was pulled back and eventually rose and surged through our neighborhood like a raging black river, affecting mostly those living in lower areas like us. Things were falling, we were screaming, we were saving as many important things as possible. Kids eventually evacuated to our store building in a higher area, and we didn't mind what would happen to our house. We just wanted to survive the raging river that invaded and ruined our home.

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It happened so quickly; one moment, we felt safer inside our home, and the next moment, we felt homeless, seeing our house badly damaged by the storm surge. As the rain receded and the storm passed, we took the courage to see the world outside. We then realized that we were luckier.

I still remember we were walking on the streets going to the town area; dead bodies were lying on the ground along the streets as if waiting to be claimed by their families. Many remains were unrecovered. The scene of dead bodies was a horror that will forever be printed in my mind. But the scene at the town proper was even more horrifying, as if trees, houses, and vehicles had been swallowed by water and taken down by the strong wind. Our town seemed to have been scraped off the map. People were wailing, and dogs were howling, unable to find their lost families. It was the saddest view I had ever seen in my entire life. I couldn't help myself but take in their emotions. Even tall buildings didn't escape the devastation, and it seemed impossible for us to get back on track.

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Honoring the Resilience of the Past

My hometown and the whole province were transformed into a ghost town of devastation and loss. Dead bodies are all over the place. At those moments, I felt grateful that my whole family was among the greatest survivors of the super typhoon. The following days, we faced the harsh reality of survival. I had lost neighbors and was afraid there might be friends, too, since all communications were cut off. We lacked everything: food, clean water, clothes, oil, gas, and other basic necessities. Additionally, there were no power and network signals, so it was difficult for us to communicate with loved ones in other parts of the province to check if they were safe and alive. Transportation was even more difficult; so many people traveled by foot just to get to the other side of the province.

We felt completely incomplete! But at least we were alive.

But then, as the saying says, "There's a silver lining behind dark clouds."

In the middle of the devastation, we found strength in each other since we had to live on our own. There were no poor and rich. Then blessings poured when the whole world sympathized with us. Eventually, aid, support, good relief, and donations arrived, which greatly helped us slowly get back on track and build what we had lost while strengthening our resilience.

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The struggle was real. But we were not alone. It was when even strangers were willing to reach out their helping hands, and seeing many people showing their acts of kindness gave me hope. Then I realized that true humanity does exist amidst devastation. Although negativity happened around this era, particularly in handling donations and financial support from different local and foreign organizations, we just looked at the positive side of it. At least, there were people who genuinely helped us restore our lives and community and went through us until we recovered from the hardest hit of our lives.

The recent typhoon crisis and upcoming typhoons that have yet to enter the Philippine Area of Responsibility sometimes worry us. We are afraid to let history repeat itself. Each year, up to 20 typhoons enter PAR, which has more numbers than any other country in the world. That's how unlucky our country is to be surrounded by a body of water, especially facing the Pacific Ocean. Some of those are strong typhoons that caused floods and devastation in different areas of our country, which are still recovering today. So, this is the main crisis that our country faces each year, and it is unsolvable by any administration.

Each time my mom read the news related to typhoons, she would worry and pray for the safety of everyone and hope for typhoons to just disappear in the air and not create havoc on the land. As a survivor herself, she doesn't want to go back to the past and suffer the same devastation that ruined thousands of lives of Filipinos. She herself experienced trauma from Yolanda and doesn't want to experience it again.

Typhoon Yolanda is a name that is forever engraved in our minds. However, I believe that the big transformation of our town and city from 2013 to this year has something to do with the donations we received during the typhoon Yolanda era. So, each time I walk through our town and city streets, the scenes always remind me of the havoc and resilience during the devastation.

Typhoon Yolanda may be the deadliest event in our lives, but memories live on. Not the destruction memories but the stories of survival, resilience, and humanity. It did prove that there's a silver lining behind dark clouds.

My hometown, Basey, today. Image credit to Sonja Visuals

May the souls of those who passed and those who have not found be forever in peace.

Except for those with references, all photos are mine. The beautiful sunset photos were taken yesterday. It's the riverside view from our house. The rainbow photo was taken during my last visit to the city. I had a collection of photos during typhoon Yolanda; however, my memory card was corrupted when I inserted it in an internet cafe's computer a month after recovering from the typhoon. They probably were not worth saving as they might just evoke emotions.

Thanks for your time.

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