A month after Yolanda: Survivors continue to fight for survival

CEBU, Philippines - A month after the Yolanda devastation, relatives of the missing victims here in Tacloban City were still optimistic to find the bodies of their loved ones.

Trinidad Nario, an 81-year-old resident along the coastal Magallanes Street where almost all houses were destroyed to the ground, told The Freeman she still hoped to find her 50-year-old daughter Rosa Nario, who remained missing to this day. "At my age, I didn't lose hope to find her. She's my daughter. Finding her body would be enough," she said.

The Nario family was among the residents in this worst-hit area of the city where dead bodies were believed to have been "buried" by the piles of debris, considering the stench of death still hanging in the air to this day.

The retrieval operations have been very slow until now, with cadavers, already in advanced state of decomposition, remained uncollected in some areas of the city. Retrieval teams have been in a rush to do their job but then identification procedures on the dead have slowed down them down relatively.

Trinidad, along with other survivors in Tacloban have started rebuilding their houses at the same site they had before. This despite the plan of the city government to ban the displaced residents from going back to their previous lots and rebuild their houses.

"We are willing to relocate if the government orders us to do so, but for now we have to have at least a decent shelter outside of the evacuation center," said Trinidad.

Without the help of the government, many of these people had to gather the lumber and GI sheets from the debris and use these to rebuild their houses. Some of them even used as their residence the nine ships that were washed ashore, saying these were sturdier than anything else for a house.

From Rawis in Anibong district up to San Jose, all coastal areas, people have been busy rebuilding their houses, which they said were just temporary shelters for them.

On relief distribution, it has been a very hard situation for the victims, like a fight for the fittest and the fastest to get through the long lines. "If  you're not among those listed in the evacuation centers, sorry ka na lang; you can't get any relief goods," said a resident.

All "outsiders" of the evacuation centers had to run and push themselves into the queue just to get relief packs. "The lines have been too rowdy, with some getting through first by using contacts ahead of the distribution," said another victim who had only received the goods thrice since the typhoon struck.

The city's downtown area has been transformed into a marketplace where stalls abound, selling anything from clothes to cellphones, apparently coming from people who looted the malls. The previous public market remained a mess, and all items for sale are overpriced, with transportation costs hiked to unprecedented level.

Power have been restored alright, but only in some streets of the city and government offices such as the City Hall, the Capitol, and along the national roads from here to Palo and Tanauan towns. The promise of Energy Secretary Jericho Petilla to restore power in Leyte by Dec. 24 may be possible, said a radio reporter.

For residents, however, it will be another matter. All of them have been ordered to re-apply at the Leyte Electric Cooperative to get a new meter and electrical connection.

The Freeman saw the long lines of applicants for power connection to their houses and businesses and, if ever power is restored in the coming days, they will be the last to get it because they have to wait for the approval of their applications for reconnection, and the attendant work of the Leyeco personnel to install the wirings.

For now, all members of the media in the city who lost their houses but survived Yolanda's wrath have gathered in the so-called One Media center at the Leyte Sports Center, leaning on each other for strength and hope to bring back their normal lives once more. (FREEMAN)