ondoy-ed

last sunday, i wrote about ondoy wreaking havoc on metro manila, parts of central luzon and calabarzon. ondoy's great flood, the worst in 40 years, did not spare our home in novaliches. i wanted to go home immediately but could not due to dizziness. good thing, i was allowed to go home earlier last tuesday. the fx took the 'shortcut', which is actually the long route to novaliches proper, snaking through what they call SB way from talipapa to doña rosario.

during this ride, i saw trail of ondoy's destruction. home furnishings of mid-level income families were all put under the sun, outside their houses. nearing novaliches proper, even deeper level of destruction was seen. shantytowns that i've been used to seeing whenever we pass SB way, were completely nil. those areas looked like bangladesh-like flooded areas, debris were all over and people were trying desperately to salvage whatever they can. dried up mud covered half of the streets, trees uprooted and factory walls collapsed. garbage-hills were all over. grabe.

i was prepared to see the same gloomy picture when i get to our barangay. to my relief, everything seemed to be back to its normalcy, except for some neighbors who were doing their laundry outside. tita jo was busy taking papa's maong pants to and from a neighbor's house. apparently, she requested the use of our neighbor's drier since their electricity is free! our house was already cleaned, no more muddy waters, but the living room has yet to resemble its old form. sofas were still wet and they couldn't use some of the appliances anymore, like the washing machine and gas stove, and even the rice dispenser was nowhere to be found!

with all these, i'm still thankful that my family is safe. apart from minor damage to property, we didn't have to go through others' experience of being trapped on roofs with no food and soaked in rain. they were safe in our second floor and no untoward incident happened to anyone of us. we just have to be prepared, especially with pepeng (international name: typhoon parma), nearing super typhoon status, as it is expected to make a landfall this saturday.

pictures below were taken by my sis liezl on sunday morning.