Recalling Odette: A Night We Will Never Forget

Friday, December 17, 2021

Last night, a typhoon came and ravaged the whole of Central Visayas, for the first time since Typhoon Sendong, and this time with Cebu and Bohol right in the middle of its trajectory. Although news had already been circulating about it a week before it arrived, and despite all the preparations we made, it still caught all of us by surprise.

On my end, I spent majority of my day, if not, the whole day yesterday preparing for the destruction that was about to come. I woke up to a Thursday to grey skies and a sense of impending doom in my chest hurriedly trying to list down things to prepare for before She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named (Odette) comes to town. I could have done it a day before if it weren't for the consecutive line of responsibilities and deliverables from school, work and side work whose loose ends I had to tie, even though there was some questionable degree of guarantee that everything would be put to a halt on the day of landfall. I got caught up with the conflicting and confusing priorities at that time.

I was able to do groceries, even if it was at the last minute, even when all the shrubberies and trees of the city already showed the much needed urgency to go home, prepare the sandbags, and take cover. There was no time to be slow and weak at 10 am.

Light drizzles came and went, much like a sinister version of a warm-up before a workout, followed by the first of the many heavy rainfalls. It came at 4 pm, but there was already no sight of the sun anywhere in the sky. My anxieties were triggered by the fact that the typhoon had already started reaching the other end of Bohol by this time, yet the roads of Tagbilaran City have already become a danger zone. That's when I knew that no one in this family was going to get any sleep tonight, and it was going to be a long battle until daylight.

At 5 PM, amidst the heavy rainfall and nightmare-ish winds, my body gave in to the exhaustion of the preparations and fell asleep. I woke up an hour or so later to the sound of roof sheets being stripped off our neighbor's house. That's pretty much how all of us spent the night. If not roof sheets, branches, if not branches, we guess to probably be public signages or flying pieces of metal that got unhinged from its origin. In one way or another, this sinister guessing game filled us with dread but also helped us stayed alert throughout the whole evening.

By this time, the electricity and water had already gone out. I wouldn't have really minded this if it was any other day. But the thing is, I was already on the first day of my period by this time. What's more annoying than heavy blood flow and dysmenorrhea? It's having heavy blood flow, dysmenorrhea AND lack of water but I knew that this was no time to complain about my monthly cycle.

My family and I have had our own fair share of experiences of typhoons, some of which left our first floor completely flooded. So by the virtue of "lessons learned", we prepared everything ahead: lifted the items that aren't supposed to get wet, made sure the windows and openings were sealed tight, prepared brooms and several "kabô"s, all that jazz. I'd get goosebumps everytime I try to take a peek outside. I was on flood watch throughout the night while checking in on my loved ones, especially high school classmates as a coping strategy while signal was still available. My brothers coped by playing chess or equalizer that night, while my grandma made dinner.

It's a miracle that amidst that nightmare of a night, my highschool friends and I still have had the energy to send memes and make fun of our current situation. Some of them already had their roofs unhinged. Roof sheets flung and nowhere to be found. Some left in flooded floors and faucet-dripping ceilings, and despite all of these, we were still able to laugh at the joke on how next time, all of us should write our names on roof sheets so it would be easier to collect once they're flung from the roof. 😂 Not a joke for the most sensitive of people, but among my circle of friends, it WAS funny at that time. I guess that's what people mean when they mention Filipinos' resilience? 🥲

One friend of mine completely lost their roof and resorted to using an umbrella inside their home, another had to sleep in the sofa because their bed became completely soaked, another sent a picture of the amount of water they had to sweep out, and all of these I found out in real time through . On my end, I only had to sacrifice my yoga mats to completely seal the crevices of the doors to slow down any water coming in. It's a small sacrifice to pay compared to what was happening to my loved ones, and even though I was helping them laugh off the tragedy, I couldn't help but feel for them also.

My family and I are fortunate, so fortunate, so blessed, to have had our gutter systems repaired prior the typhoon, and never again will I doubt my dad's Civil Engineering skills as our the roof in our house survived and stayed in tact after that horrible night.

Now I am writing this, a day after the nightmare, wine in hand, listening to Coldplay in the candlelight (because of the lack of electricity) and contemplating about how my family, loved ones and I are going to move past this.

Let Somebody Go
Everglow
Princess of China
Charlie Brown
even ❤️

Things are grim right now, yes. A while ago, I got to walk around the city and look at the aftermath of the typhoon. There was a lump on my throat, the more I watched trees and posts topple one house to another. Roads were blocked and tree trunks were hanging on literal wires that only motorcyclists in their right minds can pass through.

It will probably be a month until electricity will completely come back, and water around the same time as well.

But to be here with my family, several candles spent, no proper shower for the nth day, hugging our dogs and cat to sleep, with a lack of sufficient signal anywhere, having little to contact to our loved ones checking from outside of the island as of writing this, and my imagination flying in and out of the poetry in Coldplay's lyrics, I feel so glad to be alive.

As a Filipino, it's probably the first time in a long time that I felt mapagmalasakit sa kapwa with much conviction. Everyone was devastated, but everyone moved. Everyone started getting back up a day after the typhoon left, and I am thankful to have witnessed this, and to be a part of this. This hope. This camaraderie. This gratefulness.

While we rebuild ourselves from the debris and rubble, please pray for my fellow Visayan countrymen 🇵🇭. Some lost their belongings, some lost their roofs, some lost their homes and some probably even lost their lives. Please keep them in your thoughts, while I say this one time with conviction:

"Bagyo ra to. Bisaya ta!"

About The Protean Creator:

_{Roxanne Marie is the twenty-year-old something who calls herself the Protean Creator.}

_{She is a chemical engineer by profession, pole-dancer and blogger by passion and frustration, and lastly, a life enthusiast. She is on a mission to rediscover her truth through the messy iterative process of learning, relearning and unlearning. Currently, she works as a science and research instructor in her hometown, Tagbilaran City, all the while documenting her misadventures, reflections and shenanigans as a working-class millennial here on Hive.}

_{If you like her content, don't forget to upvote and leave a comment to show some love. It would be an honor to have this post reblogged as well. Also, don't forget to follow her to be updated with her latest posts.}