Ondoy

Last Friday Daniel and I went out for a few hours and when we got home I saw just a few minutes of one of the local news channels, which I never watch mainly because half of it is usually in Tagalog and I don't understand Tagalog. Anyway, they mentioned a tropical storm that was headed for Luzon and said it would make landfall late that night. So, I planned taking time Saturday to catch up on the blog and write some about the trip that Daniel's brother had just made to Manila, since that meant rain most of the day. It wasn't long after I woke up on Saturday that I realized this wasn't our average tropical storm that we get in the area. Usually at least once a month between June and November we get a storm in the area and the only way you can tell is that it rains a lot for a few days. This storm didn't just rain though, it literally was monsoon type rain for at least 24 hours straight, without any breaks. It didn't even lighten up a little during that time. It was crazy. Well, about mid morning our power went out and it stayed out until Monday night. (Sort of, we had a brief few hours of power Monday morning before it went out again.) Anyway, we live in a building with a back up generator, so I wasn't too worried. I know from the last time we got hit by a huge storm that the generator wouldn't be able to run for 24 hours straight and that it would need to be turned off every few hours, but I remember from 3 years ago, that it was enough to recharge computer batteries and phones and keep the refrigerator cold. So, I really wasn't too worried until Sunday afternoon when we learned that the generator finally broke and they weren't able to fix it. They actually managed to get it fixed mid morning on Monday for a few hours of electricity before power was restored that night. All of this to say we were very blessed and that was our biggest problem during resulting from the storm.

On Sunday morning when the generator had stopped to rest for a few hours Daniel and I decided that we would try to find a Starbucks or some coffee shop that was open and get out of the house a little. We did not realize at that point how bad things had gotten on Saturday. Immediately as we were leaving the condo building this is what we saw in the road...


There were trees down all along the road out of our subdivision, but once again we didn't really realize the full extent of the damage. Once we got out of our subdivision one thing we began to understand more that this was not just another bad tropical storm or typhoon. We soon saw a major road near us that was completely flooded. It is not unusual for this area to flood, but it is usually still passable, Sunday it was not. We also learned that the only other major road leading into metro Manila was also not passable. Where we live was completely cut off from the rest of the city until Monday when waters finally started to recede. This is when the full weight of what had happened started to dawn on me. Until we moved here I have never lived anywhere near a coastal area, so I don't have many years of experience with tropical storms or hurricanes or typhoons, but I will say I have never seen flooding like I have seen in the few days after the storm. Nor have I heard of so many people we know loosing literally everything they have due to the floods. I am very thankful that we live where we live. Our condo is built up a little on a hill and the area we live in is uphill when you are coming from the city, so our immediate area received some damage, but compared to what I've heard and seen in pictures, it is nothing compared to the damage that people only a few miles from where we lived suffered. Right now, we are still trying to figure out the best way to help others who were more severely affected than us. In fact right now Daniel is meeting with a man who helps him with some of the basketball ministry to see how we can help. All I know is that he texted Daniel and said he and his family lost everything. I cannot imagine what they are going through right now. Please pray with us that God will give us direction on how best to help those affected and that even through all this that He will be glorified.

Anyway, I am sure I will write more in a few days about how things seem to go, especially since there are two more storms in the Pacific that seem to be headed our way later this week and early next week. But in the mean time here is a short video of the golf course that we live across the street from and the damage that was done to the fence along the road. I know you can't see it in the video, but somewhere in the river a car had gotten swept away and is stranded.




This is JoAnn on Sunday morning after driving around with Daniel and I for a couple hours once we finally found a Starbucks that was actually open. I think she was just grateful to be out of the car.