The Neighborhood After Odette

Our neighborhood is one that is filled with so many different trees around. Coconuts, mango trees, star apples, moringa plants, banana trees, papaya, and even Philippine Lemon. In front of our house is a melon tree, at the sides are mango trees, Mahogany, and Gemilinas. At the back are bananas and Acacia.

Today, these trees are never the same after Odette. I highly recommend reading the first part first: https://read.cash/@Momentswithmatti/odette-a-name-i-wont-forget-862833d5

By the early morning on the 17th of December, we felt the wind had subsided, the rain had stopped. There was silence, our noisy dogs' mouths were zipped and it was very quiet and calm. I told my husband we must check out our neighborhood and the downtown in the morning and witness what Odette had done.

It was 5:30 AM when I woke up because our neighbors were already talking outside about their experiences, I could hear motorcycle engines moving, so I woke up my husband and since my baby was still sleeping, I told him to explore by himself instead.

But as I got out of our room, I saw a saddening view - a huge chunk of the neighbor's mango tree is covering our gate, we can't get out by the main gate so we had to use the one in my father's office. Our fence is now in a slanting position, the wires were cut and were under the mango tree.

A huge part of our terrace roof has been broken, some ceilings were torn, the gutters were missing. Thankfully, a big part of it is still intact. Our room and the offices are all fine. There was water on the floors and that's alright. But my brother's store was wiped out exposing some of the stocks inside.

My husband decided to walk downtown. On his way down, he took pictures and videos. A lot of the coconut trees were already down. Roofs were found at the street electrical posts. Most of the street lamps were destroyed, the trees had fallen into roofs, the street wires were all cut and were just lying on the wet street. A lot of leaves cover the road.

The neighbors were all busy clearing up the road. Then as he reached the ricefield area, it was like a lake this time. There were many coconuts floating, many rubbish had piled up. The trees were uprooted in this area, there was mud here and there and houses were damaged. Their banana trees had bowed down.

Then the downtown, the Christmas decorations were all destroyed, a few days ago, there was an opening of the Christmas decoration display which I wasn't able to see yet but it won't be possible anymore because it is all wiped out now. The town's municipal plaza is not a good sight. The roofs of the town's waiting shed had been destroyed too. There were so many electrical posts that were down so it was hard for vehicles to pass by certain areas. The Guindulmanons were trying to manually clear these out at that time.

So many people were walking, talking to one another about how they felt about the storm, how their houses were damaged, how they felt really sad knowing their livelihood had been affected, a lot of hogs and animals were displaced and they were all out looking for them. Then there were even some who had just returned home from evacuation centers to check how their homes look now after the storm.

Then they still managed to smile, laugh at how they all survived that night. I saw some on their motorbikes shouting to one another and giving their smiles. I see how resilient these people are. I saw hope.

The storm may have left most of us with damaged houses, some even without one but it also showed how strong we are as Guindulmanons, as Boholanos. The electricity supply is out, there's no power, no cellular signal and in the next days and weeks, we will have to go back to basic. This was my first time to experience such horrible sight and it was not a good thing to behold but surely, Boholanos will rise up again, moving on and forward is the only way to go.

xoxo,

momentswithmatti

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