THE HOWLING WINDS
You may not notice it but I have just began blogging today. It is a fulfillment of a dream that I have nurtured for some years now. I could have started earlier if I knew that creating a blog spot was not as difficult as I initially believed. Just follow some simple instructions and voila, you have a a blog spot you can call your own.
Being a new blogger, I cannot stop the thrill and excitement welling up inside me. It makes me so anxious to write on almost anything that interests me. Yet, this may not be practicable so let me just share with you an experience I just had.
When President Arroyo declared that only November 1 would be non-working holiday (a marked departure from previous years where November 2 was also declared as such), supposedly upon the prompting of powerful businessmen, I decided to leave for my beloved hometown of Alicia in the Province of Isabela on Friday, October 28, 2006, right after work in Quezon City. I planned to stay there only for the weekend, which I thought was enough time to be with my wife, who is currently enrolled in a nursing school there, rekindle ties with my blood kins, and, more importantly, pay respect to dearly departed family members. The Victory Liner bus terminal in Kamias, Quezon City, which bus company daily plies the Cagayan Valley route with its fleet of airconditioned buses, was brimming with passengers that night, who, I suppose, were also on their way to visit their dead relatives and friends. Due to the influx of passengers, I managed to buy a ticket for the second to the last trip. The bus left at 11:30 p.m. and after a gruelling nine-hour travel, punctuated by a traffic build up along the Maharlika Highway in the mountainous part of Nueva Vizcaya, we finally arrived, safe and sound, in Santiago City, where I was met by my wife. Together, we took a mini-bus for the thirty-minute ride to my hometown, Alicia.
I thought my homecoming would relatively be uneventful. Actually, it was at first. Exhausted by the trip, I decided to simply spend the whole day of Saturday lounging in the house in the company of my wife, my mother and other family members. The gloomy weather did not help any to bolster my wanderlust spirit. So, I put off my visit to the cemetery the morning of the next day, right after the missal service.
Sunday began with a drizzle. Our house being situated about a kilometer or so away from the church, it was an effort to go to the mass. I told my wife we will just attend the mass scheduled in the afternoon at 5 p.m. In the meantime, we would wait for the weather to clear a bit so that we could troop to the cemetery and be with our dead even for a short time.
Yet, the weather was uncooperative. As the day progressed, the drizzle became a downpour that seemed to last for eternity. Any plan of going out, even my trip back to Manila, was basically ruled out. It would not be good, health-wise, to brave the heavy rain, what with the flu cases rising up.
Stucked at the house, we tuned in to the radio, hoping to get any weather news. There, we learned about the impending landfall of typhoon, locally code-named "Paeng." I heard
the reporter saying that the typhoon had been classified as signal no. 4 and was expected, based on PAG-ASA estimation, to hit Isabela around 8 p.m. People were warned to stay home and braced for the strong winds.
As predicted, supertyphoon "Paeng" did arrive at around 8 p.m. It brought with it tremendous winds. So powerful were the winds that they howled and whistled. Though the house was made of concrete, it seemed to have felt the force of the storm. The windows crackled and the ceiling creaked under the weight of the winds. We thought we were in for a disastrous evening.
Yet, after several hours of uncertainty, the winds abated. With the electrical blackout, however, we had no way of knowing whether the storm has passed. Yet, believing the worst was over, we finally had our sleep, albeit guarded and uneasy, for the night.
The devastation wrought by the storm became evident to us the next day. Our backyard was strewn with felled trees, which were uprooted. Banana plants were cut down as if they were hit by a scythe. Some coconut trees, which are believed to be impregnable even against the strongest of winds, were also buckled.
In the neighboring towns we visited later in the day, we saw swollen rivers overflowing their banks and inundating outlying agricultural fields as well as houses.
Yet, against the backdrop of the devastation, people still went on their routine of paying a visit to their dearly departed ones as I personally witnessed when I myself went to the cemetery. I guess, no storm is strong enough to make us forget and forgo of our filial obligations!
So what happened after? Instead of staying only for two days in the province, I filed a leave for another two days. I finally went back to Manila on Wednesday, November 1, 2006.
Being a new blogger, I cannot stop the thrill and excitement welling up inside me. It makes me so anxious to write on almost anything that interests me. Yet, this may not be practicable so let me just share with you an experience I just had.
When President Arroyo declared that only November 1 would be non-working holiday (a marked departure from previous years where November 2 was also declared as such), supposedly upon the prompting of powerful businessmen, I decided to leave for my beloved hometown of Alicia in the Province of Isabela on Friday, October 28, 2006, right after work in Quezon City. I planned to stay there only for the weekend, which I thought was enough time to be with my wife, who is currently enrolled in a nursing school there, rekindle ties with my blood kins, and, more importantly, pay respect to dearly departed family members. The Victory Liner bus terminal in Kamias, Quezon City, which bus company daily plies the Cagayan Valley route with its fleet of airconditioned buses, was brimming with passengers that night, who, I suppose, were also on their way to visit their dead relatives and friends. Due to the influx of passengers, I managed to buy a ticket for the second to the last trip. The bus left at 11:30 p.m. and after a gruelling nine-hour travel, punctuated by a traffic build up along the Maharlika Highway in the mountainous part of Nueva Vizcaya, we finally arrived, safe and sound, in Santiago City, where I was met by my wife. Together, we took a mini-bus for the thirty-minute ride to my hometown, Alicia.
I thought my homecoming would relatively be uneventful. Actually, it was at first. Exhausted by the trip, I decided to simply spend the whole day of Saturday lounging in the house in the company of my wife, my mother and other family members. The gloomy weather did not help any to bolster my wanderlust spirit. So, I put off my visit to the cemetery the morning of the next day, right after the missal service.
Sunday began with a drizzle. Our house being situated about a kilometer or so away from the church, it was an effort to go to the mass. I told my wife we will just attend the mass scheduled in the afternoon at 5 p.m. In the meantime, we would wait for the weather to clear a bit so that we could troop to the cemetery and be with our dead even for a short time.
Yet, the weather was uncooperative. As the day progressed, the drizzle became a downpour that seemed to last for eternity. Any plan of going out, even my trip back to Manila, was basically ruled out. It would not be good, health-wise, to brave the heavy rain, what with the flu cases rising up.
Stucked at the house, we tuned in to the radio, hoping to get any weather news. There, we learned about the impending landfall of typhoon, locally code-named "Paeng." I heard
the reporter saying that the typhoon had been classified as signal no. 4 and was expected, based on PAG-ASA estimation, to hit Isabela around 8 p.m. People were warned to stay home and braced for the strong winds.
As predicted, supertyphoon "Paeng" did arrive at around 8 p.m. It brought with it tremendous winds. So powerful were the winds that they howled and whistled. Though the house was made of concrete, it seemed to have felt the force of the storm. The windows crackled and the ceiling creaked under the weight of the winds. We thought we were in for a disastrous evening.
Yet, after several hours of uncertainty, the winds abated. With the electrical blackout, however, we had no way of knowing whether the storm has passed. Yet, believing the worst was over, we finally had our sleep, albeit guarded and uneasy, for the night.
The devastation wrought by the storm became evident to us the next day. Our backyard was strewn with felled trees, which were uprooted. Banana plants were cut down as if they were hit by a scythe. Some coconut trees, which are believed to be impregnable even against the strongest of winds, were also buckled.
In the neighboring towns we visited later in the day, we saw swollen rivers overflowing their banks and inundating outlying agricultural fields as well as houses.
Yet, against the backdrop of the devastation, people still went on their routine of paying a visit to their dearly departed ones as I personally witnessed when I myself went to the cemetery. I guess, no storm is strong enough to make us forget and forgo of our filial obligations!
So what happened after? Instead of staying only for two days in the province, I filed a leave for another two days. I finally went back to Manila on Wednesday, November 1, 2006.
posted by dr. a.n. reb at
10:29 AM
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