TACLOBAN CITY—Two weeks into the aftermath of Super Typhoon Yolanda, survivors in Tacloban struggle to live normal lives, despite the lack of the most basic of supplies.
From the airport to the capitol, one travels through a long highway of nothing but devastation of biblical proportions.
But while the typhoon spared no one in its path, the aftermath only illustrated that there still exists the Great Divide between the rich and poor.
The difference is appalling.
On Real Street in downtown Tacloban, for instance, all the poor men's houses, made of wood, are completely wiped out; no roofs, no walls. Some of those that have remained standing, but also heavily damaged, are the concrete ones owned by businessmen and professionals.
A poor family of five doesn't want to leave their house-- or what is left of it: They cook, they wash clothes, and sleep there night after night. “We try to improvise,” said Mario Bautista, 60. “We gathered some plywood from the debris and put them together like a roof. We can't leave it. We have nowhere else to go. This is the only one we've got.”
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| A man begs for food at the Abucay transport terminal in Tacloban. Many poor people who haven't eaten for days have been reduced to begging; the well-off simply left for safer climes. |
Across his house is a sprawling compound where still stands a heavily-damaged Spanish-type house. The owners left for Manila three days ago, shortly after a commercial arline resumed flight; only the househelp are around to keep 24-hour watch. “The owners are now staying in their parents' house in Makati,” a helper said.
While a poor man's place seems like an open field covered with debris, a rich man's gates are under lock and key. “We don't want any untoward incident. Some people might just come in and attack us [as they] search of food,” the family's laundrywoman said.
The owner of Biadra Pensione House, who came home to Tacloban in September to prepare her resort for a grand reunion of Class 1973 of Leyte National High School in December, has also flown back to Cebu then to Manila, throwing all preparations out the window, according to her classmate Joe, 60.
“No reunion will take place until perhaps Christmas next year,” he said. “It will take months, if not years to rehabilitate this place.” The pension house is in total disarray. “It's so bad, we don't know where to start first. But if its any consolation, we have an endless supply of wood for fuel,” he said wryly, referring to the endless stretch of debris across the city.
On Gomez Street, an imposing four-story concrete house owned by a Chinese businessman and his three sisters still stands. It suffered no damage, except that the typhoon knocked down its power and water supply--like those of the rest.
On Wednesday, the owners all left, using a plane owned by a family friend, according to the house's caretaker Elsa.
Before leaving, the man of the house recalled his driver and his three sons from an evacuation center and asked them to also stay in the house, she added.
All the owners' stores have been locked. “But the family left us with a truckload of water and food supplies,” she said.
Some are not as lucky.
Walking for days, without food
Carmen, 78, has been walking around downtown looking for food from the debris. When News5 stopped to greet her, she quipped: “Do you have extra food? I have not eaten anything for so many days.” Given three small bars of Kitkat chocolates, she was jumping with glee.
A few kilometers away near the Sto Nino Church, a long queue of survivors were seated, waiting for their turn for some treatment and medicines in tents put up by a 25-man Japanese Medical Mission.
Most of the patients come from poor familes, according to Joji Tomioka, a Japanese doctor. He said his group has treated over 1,000 patients, mostly needing antibiotics, pain relievers, and drugs for coughs an colds. Others are young mothers with their infants. Most of those lining up for relief goods from a nearby post of the Philippine Navy also came from poor families.
An old man walking with a cane who tried to find his way to the Japanese tent fell twice on the road. Told by two policemen who helped him get up that he should have rented a tricycle, he replied: “I have no money to pay for my fare. The tricycle fare has gone up 500 times,” he said.
Elsewhere, people have struggled to pick up the pieces. Young men have their hands full clearing roads. They sorted out garbage from bodies of victims.
At least 20 bodies have been recovered in downtown Tacloban the past two days, but no wake services have been offered to any of these, all now in black bags. “We don't know whose relative is this,” a man in his 20s said, referring to a cadaver just outside his gate. “We can't claim it. We don't know the guy.”
Such irony: too many unclaimed bodies, but also too many people still unsuccessfully looking for their loved ones. Why the identities of the dead and missing don't match, no one could say.
An old woman tirelessly looking for her man the past days ended up praying in the Sto Nino Church that former First Lady Imelda Marcos turned into an imposing edifice. The woman blamed no one for her misfortune-- neither the local nor the national government. “The devil sent the rains,” she said. “I will continue to do what I can. I leave to God the rest.”
