After Typhoon Odette/Rai, it became a mess. Trees fell down, properties got destroyed, and affected families cried.

But my family immediately took some action to our belongings, and the house.

Cleaning and Repairing the house.

When we saw our house got its roof removed, dirt and mud all around the place, ceilings are gone, and every thing got wet, we immediately take actions.

We completely removed the rest of the ceiling since it's already wrecked, cleaned the floors and arranged the GI sheets we used for the roof.

Because of the storm, some of the roofs got holes, so we throwed it or used it again and just put some Styrofoam-and-gasoline mix (the styrofoam melts when mixed with gasoline, don't know why. Substitute for epoxy) and let it dry.

We took some things we left during the storm, like father's tools, sister's books she bought, our medals and pictures we hanged on the walls, clothes and other stuffs. It was wet, but some are safe, especially in the right corner of the house (when looking at the front door).

Thankfully, our personal documents were dry, but to make sure they don't get wet during cleaning, we placed it inside of our cousin's house.

Then after arranging everything, we cleaned the entire house...

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It took a while cleaning the floors, the windows and such, but with teamwork, we finally cleaned the house.

We have some rest for that work, but my father wants to put the undamaged roofs back. And so he did.

He put the roof back above the living room since he wants us to sleep at the house, and the living room was okay to stayed in. Then the kitchen room because, you know, cooking food.

Since he did that in the afternoon, it may took a while to place back the roof, so he rested.

Our Substitute for Electricity

As me and family are using devices like phones and a laptop, we don't know where to charge in case when we needed to use it. We also needed light, because, bruh, its super dark when there's no light.

And my intelligent father had a plan.

I learned this to my father when he was doing the work, but motorcycle/car battery can be charged when the vehicle has gas, just turn the vehicle on and let it stay for few minutes to charge the battery.

The battery can also be used for emergency LED lights and car charger. And since my uncle has a spare charger, my father borrowed it.

Now we were able to charge and have some light at night!

Blessing after blessing

Before putting the roofs back to place, a storekeeper ask to help her out at my cousin's home. She still had some items at her store. So they helped her.

And boy, they carried 3 barrels of rice, some canned foods and necessities, as well as clean water and perishable foods.

And luckily, to consume it at once, she distributed all the perishable goods since it will just go to waste when not frozen. As well as clean water and free necessities like canned goods, soap, lighter, etc.

In the afternoon, my mom and I took a walk to the nearest "bodega" or storehouse.

She wants to buy a sack of rice in that storehouse. And then the owner said there's some rices that are didn't get wet and still good for consuming.

She gave us chicken and hotdogs. Yum. At end of the day, we had Adobo for dinner. Very good dinner after the storm.

But the price is around ₱1,900 ($36.95, in February 8, 2022),which is pretty expensive for me. But my mother only had ₱1000 on her wallet, so she negotiated the owner to pay the rest once we had enough money and pay ₱1000 today.

And, thankfully, he accepted it. We payed ₱1000 and pay the rest later. We took a sack of rice and father carried it to home. It was a good blessing. And the fact we still had enough rice at our small barrel, we still think in advanced.

And another help has given to us.

December 18, after putting the kitchen roof back, an engineer roamed around with his vehicle, since the road is now cleared for motorcycles and some vehicles. He roamed around and helped us with 5 kilos of rice. Super convenient.

And everyday, we been given canned food and bags of rice. What a blessing!

How do we collect some water if there's no water supply?

1 week after the storm, me and my cousins were thinking of something we could do to collect water to use.

And there's 2 kids carrying 4 1L of water. And we asked them both if where they collected the water.

They told us that there's a hand water pump at the next sitio, so we decided to get the empty gallons we had and headed to the water pump. And boy it was crowded.

If you lined up in the morning, you'll have to wait 30 minutes or more just to get your turn. There's so many people coming here fetching water!

And this is gonna be the another time to use a hand water pump after 4 years.

But it's so tiring to pump water in this one, so what we did is to take turns.

After we had our gallons refilled, now we have to carry it back. This is where pain begins to rise. 5 minutes walk to the water pump, now 30+ minutes when carrying 1 gallon full of water. What a day.

Tourists Walk To South Without Any Vehicles

1 week after the storm, the roads cleared out for motorcycles and people, tourists walks to South just to return home!

Imagine from Cebu City to Cebu Province! And only walking and hitchhiking or pay for a ride, in a high price!

They're so many tourists from Negros Oriental and other places walking South with food and water, but one of them asking me for a clean water, so I gave him a cup of water or 2.

It's so sad how they're just walking for almost 5 days! I wonder what's their situation now...

Before and After Road Clearing, For Real

Before the road clearing, my mother and father walked to Barangay Compostela to check the situation on the church. And boy they had to wake up early and never eat breakfast to go walk.

And they returned home at 5pm, and told us that the road ahead is greatly destroyed! No road to let the vehicle cross. The Church also left with the flooring only, but they repaired it, piece by piece. And it eventually got some supports for the temporary roof.

After road clearing, there's so many motorcycles driving from South to North and vice-versa. Some cars actually can drive now, but all vehicles had go take the alternative way.

A road from Alangasil to Anungan is used as a alternative long shortcut. And if I mean long, I mean longer than the road used before.

It was bumpy, but its okay than nothing. Otherwise, we had to take a road trip just to get around.

Desperate to Find Internet Connection

Since technology is basically a thing to human communications, we had to find a better reception to call and chat our love ones.

But it's so hard after the signal towers didn't provide any. And the signal towers on our neighbouring island is the only reception provider to this place.

Luckily, we found good reception 2 weeks after the storm.

We able to call my grandparents and chat with my friends and my relatives in Messenger.

But that reception will just past by over time. Sometimes it goes 2G, then it goes 4G later on.

But we decided to travel further South to locate better reception.

Day after that, we go to Samboan to find a signal. Its also good to go there since our uncle sends us money to remittance center. Luckily, we find our place.

It was so confusing how Samboan and municipalities in the South never actually got hit by the storm.

It was very convenient to tell my friends in Discord that I'm okay. And I feel relieved to know that some places, now able to repair the damages.

Gas Price Hike

In Samboan, there's so many vehicles lining up in the gasoline, but the price is high. Ranging from ₱60+ in Unleaded, pretty much expensive than before.

Luckily, we had enough funds to fill the tank full.

The New Year

Our New Year is basically, nothing special. Just some Media Noche and such, and once 12am hits, it's basically shouting and banging the cauldrons.

But on my side, I slept the entire new year! And, I don't really mind it since I understand why it's boring.

Bring Back the Electricity!

On January 8, the electric post connected to our houses are getting replaced with new, sturdier post.

As I remembered before, priority lines are the ones to get repaired first, since most government buildings, signal towers, and schools are just near the road.

But if you connected to the priority lines, you can also get your home an electricity! And I was relief that before my birthday, electricity came back!

End

It was so challenging to survive the 1 month of pretty much darkness and efforts to survive.

But it pays off with a good changes with our bodies and connections to nature since we go out sometimes.

Alot of people got their house destroyed, but they're able to build back for shelter, hopefully, all of this will go back to its normal state.

As of now, only the power is restored in highways, and economy starts to revive. People now feel more comfortable to their lives. Water still dependent, but some refilling station go back to business for clean water. Government still distributing goods as most of us needs it.

Anyways really thank you for reading this. I made this before 9:30pm since my data expires today. So I had to type this so fast.

People lost its home, but not their family.