Harrowing Tears of the Eye from the Sky

It was not a tragedy. Nor was it a story that left me helpless and hopeless. But certainly it was an event that pricks me until now every time those images of devastation it caused brush against my memory. I do not want to go back to it to experience again the heart-rending episodes that it brought with it. The traces it left behind, however, will always be to me a memory of a poignant past, with all the frustrations and disappointments associated with a disaster.

To say that typhoon Ondoy was a ravaging monster is an understatement. Perhaps it was indeed nature’s wrath, a curse for man’s complacency and neglect of his duties. But looking back, I can say that it was the weather disturbance that literally disturbed me, my home, and my loved ones.

I remember that no one had been uninformed of  its visit. But not a few were caught unprepared for the heavy rains it brought. The sweeping blows of the wind and the copious rain with which that monster executed the fierceness of its anger and the suddenness of its attack were the hallmarks of that calamity that befell and surprised me and my fellow earthlings.

I was then slouched on a chair reading a book, unmindful of what was happening outside, though aware that a typhoon was poised to unleash its fury. The wind roared and growled. Then the tears of the eye of the typhoon started trickling down from the face of the sky. No one had guessed that in a few hours or so, our house would become a basin of murky and stinking water and that in a few days my family would be dealing with a pool of stale water and muddy grounds for at least six weeks. I did not even have the slightest idea that in a matter of minutes, the table and the chair which I was until then using for my leisure time would be completely submerged in ravishing floodwaters. Like many afternoons that I had spent my time reading books and magazines in the living room of our house, I had expected nothing unusual to occur on that day when that harrowing tears of the eye from the sky paid a surprise visit.

When the first few liters of floodwater knocked on our door, I gave it no attention—I’d been used to seeing the phenomenon that it offered me no more room for surprise. A few years back, in 2001, typhoon Milenyo had done the same thing--flooding our house and forcing us to evacuate and rent another house for no less than three months. We waited, and only after the flood subsided then that we were able to go back home. I thought that same thing would not happen again. But there it was—the water started to enter by the front door, disrespectful of the dweller’s inhospitable gestures. Still, I was complacent, stubbornly confident that no such flood the same magnitude as that of Milenyo’s would ever happen again.

Inch by inch the brownish floodwater passed unobstructed and crept up so fast that in no time I found myself dodging from one tabletop to another, to window beams, and rushing to bookshelves, hurrying to save my books from drowning. Later on, before the lights were out, I saw one of my bookshelves float and got carried away by the current of the flood. I heard a loud thud. Thanks to the other large cabinet that blocked its way out. But what about my books--my books which I had bought with my own money from my savings as a grade-schooler—those precious books which to me are a remembrance of my thriftiness (and perhaps poverty) as a student (Out of my five-peso daily allowance when I was a grade-schooler and out of the ten-peso allowance when I was a high school student, I was able to buy and collect dozens of books in various subjects—some, second hand; most, brand new)—what happened to my books? I thought they were all gone. But thanks to my mother! I did not notice that she had taken it upon herself to pack those books and carry them to the second floor of our house, where we would be spending the rest of the floody days of our lives.

The wind even tried to rip our roof but was not successful. My father and I fastened its wooden beam with a rope to reinforce it. Although the galvanized iron sheet kept on banging and clanging like cymbals, the weather soon gave way to a calmer temperament.

Soon, we were forced to go to our neighbor’s house to ask for clean drinking water. We could not find our pet cats, in the mean time, but they returned when the flood was gone. I lost to the flood one whole set of Funk and Wagnall’s encyclopedia which was freely given to my mother by a kind-hearted school owner. But I am still thankful that none in my family was lost nor suffered any serious injury.