Beneath the Rubble

BAYUG ISLAND, Iligan City – For the skies, it was just another spit of rain, perhaps just stronger than in previous days.

But for people whose lives are shared with loved ones and are measured not by routines of Mother Nature but by family ties and relationships, the rains were a curse. A curse so mad, merciless and unforgiving.

And that curse is seen everywhere here in Bayug Island: devastated houses, coconut trees; shattered windowpanes, slabs of remaining concrete, crushed roofs; clothes; wooden dressers; sofas; refrigerator; photographs; mattresses.

The island, traditionally considered as the first settlement in Iligan, has now become a desolate land that breathed its last breath that fateful Friday night when waves, as if furious, came and pared off hectares and hectares of Bayug’s villages.

Located at the mouth of Mandulog River, the island has an estimated land area of 300 hectares, home to some 400 families scattered around 8 sub-villages.

Now, large portions of the coastal village are barren. There are only makeshift altars assembled out of left over pieces of wood, for candles and flowers for the dead.

Most of the survivors have sought refuge in cramped evacuation centers – public schools turned temporary shelters or tent cities donated by aid agencies.

Danny Gongob is among those who survived. But he lost his wife and two children.

I met him a day after Christmas Day, standing on a small square of concrete where their house used to stand, where the family used to live, where he slept with his wife and children every single night; where they used to spend Christmas Days together.

Now, there is nothing but a makeshift altar with a flickering candle and a bunch of pink and white flower petals for his missing loved ones.

And their dark red Spongebob mattress covered with the thickest mud, which he found a few meters away.

It was very dark when the storm came that night, he says. The grip of the waves was strong and howling, drowning the sounds of children who screamed for help.

But for Danny, there’s no time to grieve too long. He is back in Bayug only for a brief moment, as he will be going around the city and nearby villages in search of his wife and children.

Dodo Nagayag, another survivor, lost his mother and three siblings but he, too does not have enough time to weep.

To survive, Dodo must salvage whatever pieces of scrap metal left of their house and their neighbors’ too.  He will sell this for ten pesos a kilo.

With bare hands and some stones and slabs of concrete, Dodo tries to pull out from the rubble whatever rusty metal bars he could find and even the iron sheets crumpled by the waves.

Photos by me

Christmas Day in the City of the River of Gold

Photos by Jes Aznar and text by Iris Gonzales

CAGAYAN DE ORO – We can smell the stench of death even before we actually stepped on Burgos Street, a place where two rivers converge nearby, one of thousands of devastated patches of earth here in the province.

The putrid smell of decomposing bodies; of dead Carabaos, of cats and dogs; of men, women and children, pervades the air. I am standing in the middle of a long narrow road alongside Cagayan de Oro River. If pain had a smell, this would be it.

Both sides of the road are lined with houses devastated by the typhoon that struck in the middle of the night. The roofs are gone, the windows shattered. The doors are wide-open. The street is filled with remnants of the devastation.

Everything is covered with the thickest mud, smudged with soot and garbage: the heaps of clothes, bags, television sets, electric fans, tables, chairs, bed, curtains, pillows and whatever the residents have left. 

It is December 25, 2011 but here in the City of the River of Gold, where a tropical storm struck in the middle of the night while a father sang Christmas carols to his little girls, there’s nothing to celebrate.

There are no gifts to open, no jingling bells, no festivities, no laughter, just crumbs of homes to salvage.

Sendong, which came in the dead of night on December 16, left as swiftly as it came, killing more than 1,500 men, women and children and leaving many more homeless.

In makeshift evacuation centers, survivors swarm like mad dogs whenever relief goods arrive.

Novelyn Gales, 24 years old, lost everything to the killer floods. She is among the hundreds of evacuees seeking shelter here at Barangay Makansandig Evacuation Center.

Her three-year old baby is sleeping on a slab of plywood in a cramped space, filled with donations and shared with another family.

“We lost everything but we’re still lucky to be alive,” said Novelyn, managing a faint smile. When the floods came, she and her husband held on to a tree, the baby held tightly by both of them.

There was no time to pack anything else.

As I write this, the death toll has climbed to 1,500 according to the Office of Civil Defense: 891 dead in Cagayan de Oro and additional 451 in Iligan City.

Across the cramped evacuation center is the village where Novelyn used to live. Now, where tattered homes used to stand and little children used to roam around and play, there is nothing left but a clear view of the horizon, a devastated patch of land and a golden mosque with a crescent moon not too far away.

There is an eerie silence. By the side of the desolate village, a river of mud flows endlessly. Bloated cadavers were seen floating here the morning after the flood, Novelyn said.  Her dreams, like those of other survivors, were washed away, too.