Community

The most poignant photograph to come out of the calamity zone was certainly that one showing a tattered Philippine flag fluttering proudly amidst the ruins.

That was a compelling image, not just of defiance but also of hope. Whoever thought of resurrecting that muddied emblem and putting it up on a makeshift pole shortly after the storm passed accomplished a most eloquent deed. In the midst of so much death and destruction, the nation mattered — or, at least, it should.

If putting up that tattered flag was an instinctive response in a most calamitous moment, it demonstrates a profound sense of national community. With loved ones lost in the floods and children wailing in the debris, with supplies wiped out and all means of communications down, with whole cities washed away, only the expectation that the community will come to the rescue provided the will to survive.

The community did, although government faltered. The nation and, indeed, the world responded quickly and generously in the aftermath of calamity.

There were so many acts of humanity, of the everyday heroism of everyman, in the days after the typhoon struck. There were more volunteers than one could count, more relief items collected than could be efficiently delivered.

If there were any singular act that summed up the spirited response to the tragedy, it will have to be that small delegation of survivors of Typhoon Sendong making their way to Tacloban with bottled water and, more important, their wise counsel. Nothing revives the spirit of the calamity-stricken more than the sight of survivors of previous calamities rushing to the rescue, demonstrating it is possible not only to pick up the pieces of devastated lives but be strong enough eventually to bring relief to others.

Victims inspiring victims, nothing could be more inspiring. Nothing could be more compelling than character. Nothing could be more discouraging than the lack of it.

The first days after a natural disaster strikes are always the most critical. Even as our own government’s response was impaired by incurable partisanship and the affliction of a bureaucratic mindset, the response of the rest of the world was tremendous — and, more important, apolitical. International broadcast journalists flying into the disaster zone decried the lack of leadership and the utter chaos of our government’s response.

In the crucial days immediately after the storm struck, fleets of cargo planes from our friends and neighbors came in to remedy the serious disabilities of our government’s logistics. An entire US carrier fleet was on the scene quickly, with dozens of helicopters and hundreds of tons of relief supplies. Emergency rescue teams from Japan, the UK, Australia, France and China fanned out to the disaster zone. China sent in a magnificent state-of-the-art hospital ship to attend to the seriously injured.

We all owe them so much. So many more lives might have been lost to injury, to disease and to starvation had the international response been any less.

While our own leaders tried to suppress the casualty count by simply refusing to count, the rest of the world responded quickly so that additional casualties are averted.

In the US, Japan and Europe, schoolchildren donated their meager savings to the victims of Yolanda. Movie stars and sportsmen donated their earnings. One American actor died in a motor accident after attending a fundraiser for Leyte and Samar. All over the world, in small towns and big cities, aid was assembled for the typhoon victims. Charity is one upside for globalization.

US Secretary of State John Kerry and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon both visited the scene of heart-wrenching devastation, as did the leader of Myanmar. Pope Francis, in an incomparable gesture, asked his Papal Nuncio to celebrate Christmas Mass at Tacloban.

The international response to the calamity was simply beyond expectation. It was unprecedented — as unprecedented as the power of the typhoon itself.

The nation itself used to be the outer reaches of our sense of community, as that tattered flag in Tacloban denotes. That sense of community must now extend to a global scale. Its sense of community is completed only by assuming responsibilities.

When the rest of the world responded so generously to the disaster that is Yolanda, they were exercising their sense of responsibility as part of the human community. Calamities of a certain scale are not just national concerns. They are global concerns.

The call for assistance issued by the UN runs to about $8 billion. That will eventually overshadow whatever fund we can mobilize in the foreseeable future to rebuild the calamity zone, just as the air and naval assets our friends sent in during the trying weeks after the typhoon struck overshadowed all we can manage to mobilize.

This generosity requires a certain posture on the part of our government.

We must reassure the international community that no aid will go to waste or be lost to corruption. Reports of relief items finding their way to the local black market does not help our cause.

We must reassure the donors that the disaster zone will not only be rebuilt in good time, the entire area must be reinvented. The reconstructed communities must be more resilient to extreme weather. The local economies must be better empowered. Our own capacity to respond to disasters needs reinvention as well.

More important, our government must convincingly demonstrate it is humbled by the great response of all humanity to this calamity. We must be grateful for each and every form of assistance, big and small. We must stand in sincere wonderment at how so many ordinary people performed so extraordinarily in this crisis.