Journal Entry by the hour and minute
September 26
10:00AM
I was looking outside the window of our apartment, wondering when the rain would stop. It was about 10:04 in the morning. I cursed myself, saying I should have woke up earlier. I have a meeting in the afternoon. 2:00PM to be exact. I still had to prepare my materials. I still had to go about my morning rituals. I take my breakfast, not bothering the heavy rains pouring outside.
“It will stop in a few hours. Just one of those bad weather days,” I say to myself.
11:00AM
Finished my breakfast and also finished packing my stuff. The rain is still pouring down hard, harder than an hour ago. Living this high has its perks and problems. The weight of the wind and the rain hit our 5th floor windows. My mother is telling me to reconsider and not to leave the house anymore. I stay recalcitrant and proceed with my morning rituals.
12:00NN
After exiting the bathroom, I look out the windows.
“What the @#$. The water’s starting to rise up,” I wonder to myself. That never happened before. I start wondering if the meeting is still pushing through. I call my friend and ask him if the meeting is still a go. I am told it is. Just to fill my stomach further, I take my lunch.I am sure this will be a long day ahead.
1:00PM
The rain grows fiercer than the previous two hours. The waters have devoured most of the car tires and the people below are wading through the flood. This is really bad. I decide that I can’t risk myself going to the meeting anymore. I think this is just an appetizer for what’s going to happen the rest of the day.
I call my friend, and we decide that we won’t join the meeting. We just agree that the other attendees of the meeting (if they joined even) would understand.
7:00PM
We’ve been out of power for about 30 minutes. Normally, this area does not experience brownouts for more than 20 minutes. Looks like this is going to be one of those exceptions.
10:00PM
Well looks like this is the exception. We just tune in to the AM radio. It’s been a long long time since I last listened to the AM radio news. But I guess that’s the way it is as you grow older. You listen to FM, listen to MP3 perhaps (especially the younger ones), and then only switch on the AM radio if you don’t have TV…or power.
11:00PM
The news is depressing. I hear a lot of rescue efforts especially in the areas of Marikina, Cainta, other parts of Rizal and Ortigas Extension. I look out the window and can’t see anything as dark has fallen and there’s no electricity to power any lights.
Trapped in our own house.
September 27
6:00AM
I woke up, groggy from a sleep that felt more like a shortened nap. As if from instinct, I look through our window again. The flood water is brown, perhaps due to the mud and silt that mixed with it. It seemed almost dreamlike and I just returned to bed.
10:00AM
Power has not yet been restored. I still hear the news about the rescue efforts. Help is starting to pour in from the private sector. And I am hungry. I just grab whatever is available on the dining table.
3:00PM
Since there’s nothing much else to do in the house, I just go back to taking a nap. My neck was sore because I didn’t sleep so well last night. Zzzz
5:00PM
Upon waking up, I still feel groggy and my stomach isn’t feeling so good. The water at home isn’t clean anymore. And I’m sure it’s because of the flood water that barged into the ground floor of the apartment.
While my mother is listening to the radio, I overhear a tragic story of a family who is sharing their flood drenched house with a corpse for a relative. I also hear about other cries for help, particularly from Provident Village.I also hear of multiple stories about water reaching waist high, knee high, and worse the height of one person. I also hear about 200 people stranded in Ever. I hear about the story of one person being trapped in his car and being swept away by the flood.
8:00 PM
All the people in the house are tired and feel hot from the weather. The rain has stopped and so has the wind. It was as if nothing happened yesterday. The news is still filled with tragic stories.
1130PM
Power has been restored. We try to rest well. I consider myself, as well as my family, lucky as the only things we had to contend with was lack of power, lack of water and lack of food. Others had to contend with hypothermia, one had to contend with shielding his children from trauma knowing they had a corpse in their house, others had premature births, others, I imagine, had encountered a fate worse than death.
Today, it is September 28. It is night time. The weather outside is fine, if not a bit cold.
In closing,
To those who have plenty, share.
To those who have few, persevere.
We hope that the next typhoon will go astray and not reach our shores.
Stay safe and be content.
