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Days Six & Seven – Super Typhoon Yolanda
This day began without my usual pounding heart. The hotel has filled with people – including several children and 14 fire fighters – and life is beginning to feel not normal but something similar. I can hear the children playing outside and I can hear some neighbors building a fire and washing pots. I can even hear the engine of a motorcycle going past on …
Day Five – Super Typhoon Yolanda
Another day of the typhoon and its aftermath begins. My heart begins to pound the very second that I wake up and become conscious of where I am. It’s not fear or panic or anything like that. It’s just a sense of urgency surrounding all the things that I feel I have to do.
Yesterday morning was the same, compounded by the dark clouds and the …
Day Four – Super Typhoon Yolanda
As if a super-typhoon and storm surge weren’t enough, a low-pressure system has moved into the Tacloban area, bringing with it more rain. I was woken up early this morning to the unwelcome sound of rain drumming against my windows and, of course, pouring through the cracks and flooding the room. Being an idiot, I had put the second mattress on the floor with many …
Super-Typhoon Yolanda – My First Three Days
On Nov 8, 2013, super typhoon Yolanda (Haiyan) hit the town of Tacloban in the Philippines. I was in Tacloban at the time, and my hotel was hit with a storm surge ten feet deep. This is the first part of the journal I kept through the experience.
Pet Peeves and a World of Junk
It rained a great deal during the night and the morning sky looks grey and overcast in the narrow views I get from my windows. Not great prospects for the day, but the weather could improve.
The karaoke never started up again last night, and I will be eternally grateful for that. I really should work on my attitude, though, and knock off the passive-aggressive routine. …
Photo Walkabout and Karaoke Horror
It’s 6:30 p.m., an unusual time for me to fire up the NEO, but I have been ambushed by the horror of the Philippines once more: karaoke. I don’t know how people in this country can live like this. I find the tension is like living on top of an armed nuclear weapon. You never know when the darn thing will go off. It can …
Marabut, Legaspi, and Musings on Hotels
I needn’t have worried about the clear skies disappearing yesterday. The skies stayed clear and blue and beautiful all day long. It was probably the nicest day I’ve had in the Philippines combined with some of the nicest scenery.
Taking my bucket bath and packing up in my unusual room went without many problems. I was running out of water in my big barrel, and I …
Street Dancing in Lawaan
Yesterday was quite an unusual day weatherwise. It started off clear and beautiful. I grabbed my camera and walked down to the waterfront and along the river and nearby neighborhoods. I got some great pictures of mothers swimming in the water with their young children, teaching them to swim in fact. This was out at the end of a very long cement pier. I wasn’t …