Not Financially Wealthy But We're Wealthy With Blessings
One of my cousins who are working abroad saw the news about the typhoon. She was so agitated that our province was rarely mentioned in the national news. She was making a big fuss over it then started tagging news media stations on her posts like TV5, CNN, GMA, ABS-CBN, and ANC. She also tagged big personalities like Ellen DeGeneres, Franklin Drilon, and Bill Gates. We just laughed at her. Though she got a point of wanting the situation in our place to reach the national news, tagging Bill Gates and Ellen Degeneres is such an exaggeration.
Then the next day when no one responded to her post from the ones she tagged, she just give it up and that we should just help each other to recover on our own. She posted another one saying that she wants to raise funds to help people who have been affected by the typhoon in our Barangay. I don't know how much she raised by the time now but we just let her since it's for a good cause. After the typhoon strikes, almost all of the houses there were left with no roofs, my family and relatives are included.
My Aunt saw her posts and got inspired by her. She also starts to solicit money from her friends abroad. Fortunately, she already has raised Php 20,000 in just 2 days. She distributed Php 2,000 to each family that she selected in our place. Mostly, they were just her nephews' and brothers' families. Though it's just a small amount it's already a great help for them. It's enough to buy supplies to fix their roofs and other necessities. Right now, my Aunt is still busy reaching to her friends and previous employers to raise funds. She said she would help our distant relatives who are living near our place also.
Thinking about the damages that the typhoon has caused us, we are luckier than other neighboring cities. Unlike them, our place doesn't experience flash floods, landslides, and heavy rains. Only just strong winds and light rains. Looking back at Yolanda, we also don't experience heavy rains and strong winds though we are under signal #2, even classes are postponed for safety purposes at that time.
Though we are having slow progress unlike other neighboring cities in our place, I can still consider that we are far more blessed than them in terms of safety, natural resources, and agriculture. Up until now, our place is still considered a municipality. I guess we are one of the few municipalities left on Negros Occidental that haven't progressed to finally become a city after a long time though we are rarely struck by disasters, unlike other cities.
In terms of safety, I can say that our place is the safest in our province. Why, though? I can tell a lot of circumstances. Our place is located just 2 hours away from Mount Canlaon even though it rarely explodes, it is still active and sometimes it gives off smoke and ashfall. Even so, with that near distance even if it explodes, it would never affect us because the crater of that Volcano is facing the Canlaon City in Negros Oriental. It means that all the ashes or debris that it will give off, the most affected one is the Canlaon City. More likely, we can just feel the tremors of the earthquake when it has active activities but it's super rare, though.
When those super typhoons come, our place didn't experience that much damage. If it just rains, we will even be thankful for it lessens our jobs to allocate the waters in the irrigation to the ricefields. The strong winds are our enemy for they will pin down all our crops and trees. When Odette strikes the province, it rained hard in Bacolod City and in Kabankalan City, which greatly affects them. We are just located in between these two cities but we don't experience that heavy rain at all. I can't help but wonder if God purposely let the typhoon skip our municipality because people there have good hearts, maybe.
Right now, affected areas have been relying on NGOs, LGUs, and politicians help to give them food and water. Floods made their deep wells dirty so they don't have any source of water supply. Unlikes us here who have dug a water spring with clear and drinkable water. Since it just continues flowing there day and night, we just let our neighbors and other people have some of it every day. We just let them take a bath there, wash their laundry, and fetch lots of gallons in it. Nature is giving it for free, then we will also give it for free.
Lastly, we are agricultural land. Most of the people there have their lands to cultivate. Like us for example, we hold almost 2 hectares of land. Some parts of it are sugarcane fields, some are rice fields, some parts are for my Mum's vegetables, and the remaining is for our home lot which is surrounded by fruit trees. No matter how many calamities will pass by, we would never experience hunger over there. That would be if you love planting root crops like sweet potatoes and cassava like my Mum. We also have bananas planted all around the house just in case. If rains wouldn't stop and we can't dry some rice grains to be milled, we have those crops as alternatives.
You see, the only element lacking with us is money. If we are all financially stable, living in that kind of place would be perfect. Aside from being far from the main roads and schools, the only reason for most people to leave there is to find work outside the place so they could have a huge wage than in our hometown. I can also include the toxic attitudes of your neighbors there that make you want to leave the place. Overall, if you put aside those things, we are still blessed. It's just that a lot of people there don't realize it yet.
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Reading through I discovered you are actually naturally blessed, even in the midst of everything thing you still have clean and drinkable water and also safety from active volcano. That's really great