Scorching Skins and Strong Winds: My Typhoon Odette Experience

It has been more than a week since Super Typhoon Rai, locally known as Odette, swept the island of Cebu. For a number of days, the experiences of Cebuanos were transformed into blogs as Hivers tragically recall that long windy evening.

This is my entry.

My brother, @glecerioberto, detailed what our family has experienced. We lost all our roof, our house received major water damage, and we bid good bye to some of our things. You can check it out here.

At the moment, I am writing this blog in our newly rented place. For more than a week, I was out of touch – no power, no signal, no water. I was able to read four books from cover to cover to kill some time.

I haven’t posted in a while, and there were so many things I was able to experience that I’d like to share. But since the power was out, my power to share was also limited. I wanted to write in my laptop so badly and post in Hive.

So, yesterday, when the electricity was finally restored in our area, so did all the words that bottled in me.

I had many things, ideas, and stories I was thrilled to share to you all. But before all those things, I’d like to walk everyone through with where and how I was during the attack of Odette.

If you watched the video above, you will see a part of my experience with the Typhoon – how we glorified noodles while we were in the eye of the typhoon. But the full experience is detailed below.

DECEMBER 16

8AM

My work roommates and I were in our quarters.

I woke up feeling a lump in my throat. I checked myself and realized I was scorching. My head ached, my body felt weak, and I craved to sleep again. Luckily, there was no work today because of the Typhoon warning. Perhaps, I might sleep the whole day.

12 NN

I woke up again with the sound of my roommate inviting everyone for a lunch out. I wanted to come, but I felt very weak. So, they went out without me, and I spent lunch time watching Survivor Season 41 Finale.

When hunger finally crept to me, I decided to order fast-food chicken and burger. There was a little drizzle when I went down to get the food, but the winds were not harsh. Maybe this is a Typhoon weather that’d be nice to watch over a movie marathon, I thought. Boy, I was wrong.

3PM

When my roommates came back one by one, that’s when I learned that the Typhoon that is going to hit us was a Super Typhoon. My last experience with a Super Typhoon was in 2013 (Typhoon Haiyan locally known as Yolanda), but we weren’t affected much then, so I didn’t have enough bank of fear to recall. Although, media outlets revealed devastating effects of that Super Typhoon.

As I remember, Typhoon Yolanda both literally and figuratively destroyed lives in Leyte. Most of the destruction was due to heavy winds and a persistent storm surge that flooded and shook the areas. In my mind, I began to position that heavy destruction in Cebu – and that’s when regret poured on me as I realized I had nothing with me.

I immediately asked all my roommates if they bought food and resources in preparation for what the Typhoon would bring us. None. Did we stock food? water? candles? We realized; oh no, we aren’t ready for this.
Worse, I was intensely sick.

4PM

The winds started becoming stronger. There was a notice in social media that there will be blackout in the coming hours. I was glad I purchased a power bank weeks ago and I was able to charge it fully, but I was extremely worried my body was weak enough to brace through this storm in case the worst thing happens. I checked on my family and fortunately, they were able to do grocery for the typhoon.

6PM

This was the starting point of all the scary things we faced. The winds were a different kind of strong. It made noises. Imagine being near a takeoff of an airplane – that’s what it felt like inside the room. When we went out to feel what the winds actually feel like, we were moved by it at a distance.

Signal lights were flashed to sky like lightning. Red. Purple. Blue. For those who didn’t know, it seemed like there were different colors of lightning striking Cebu. Fortunately, the rain was not heavy – but it was consistent.

8PM

We watched the outside from our window like it was an epic movie. From a far, we were worried about the crane on top of the building predicting it would fall down. Well, it didn’t – but it did turn 90-degrees.

We witnessed the trees fall down one by one. Cars were destroyed. Sparks from condo building were evident. Winds carried the water inside the room. It was cold, but extremely colder for me as my head ached and my body is heating up with fever.
Suddenly, the inevitable black out happened.

9PM

The landfall in Cebu was supposed to be 10PM, but it happened way sooner. The next hours were excruciating. My roommates have begun feeling anxious, and I tried to sleep. The noises the wind made was louder, things were flying around the air, more trees made a thud as it feels to the cars, and my body felt weaker with anxiety.
It went on for two hours until the eye hit us.

11 PM

There was a sudden stillness. No more strong winds, no rain, no signal lights – nothing. We were in the middle of the eye of storm.

But we knew this wouldn’t last long.

We quickly checked the entire building to see what happened. The fourth floor was wrecked. Tables flew, ceiling fell, and the rooms were filled with water.

We used this time to also scavenged for food. We gathered everything we could find – noodles, eggs, salt, everything that could still be of help to fill our bellies. For sure, the stores will be closed the next day.

We cooked noodles (see video) and enjoyed a few moments before the winds came back. We also cooked for the security guards.

When everything was settled, I realized the winds will come back. So, I took melatonin tabs so I could sleep before then. It did work, as I feel into slumber for the rest of this long windy evening.

THE NEXT DAY

The sun came as if nothing happened the night before. We woke up from our bed, feeling unrested, and this is what we saw:

The Cebu we know isn’t the Cebu we see.

Let me paint the picture.

There is no power. It might take weeks before it comes back.

Electrical posts have fallen down and wires are entangled, if not destroyed.
There is no water. You can see children on the streets with a sign, "we need water."

Bottled drinking water supply is not enough. There is a huge demand, and it takes a long time to purchase one.

Trees have blocked the streets and destroyed houses and cars.

Only a few gasoline stations are open and functional, but there is such an hour-long line.

Heavy traffic. Traffic lights are out. Roads are consumed by lines for gas and water.
Public transportation is extremely difficult.

Internet is close to non-existent. Communication is very hard. Signal is bad. Some people have not received information from their loved ones.

Phones are dead. Because there is no power, people cannot be reached mostly because the battery is empty.

Fires. There have been incidence of fire because of candles.

Only a few ATM are open. There's a very long line to even use one. File transfer and online banking isn't reliable at the moment.

Cash is necessary. Yet, cash is hard to get.

Pharmacies are mostly close. Only very few convenience stores are open.

Very packed Grocery stores, and COVID protocols are out of the picture.

Hygiene is a luxury.

Extreme heat in December.

Malls will be closed till the 26th. Powerbanks are sold out.

Food is difficult to access. No water means no rice.

Houses are destroyed. Roofs are blown away. Water damage.

It's such an apocalyptic scenario. It's very heavy in the heart.

But...

There are establishment still kind enough to be evacuation centers, charging stations, and water refilling sites. But all these rely on limited supply.

MEANWHILE, AT HOME

It was extremely difficult to catch signal to know what happened at home. Public transportation was extremely difficult the day after the storm, and gasoline stations were very full. I realized I had to walk all the way home (2 hours walk, maybe?) to see what happened. But I was sick, and every step I make seemed like I was about to faint. So, I stayed for the day.

Before the signal was loss and all, the last thing I learned was that all our roof flew away and my family evacuated to a nearby sturdy house. I was extremely worried what happened next.

The next day, public motorcycles were already available, although costly. I grabbed the chance to ride one, and it was tremendously heavy traffic.
When I arrived at home, this was what I saw:

I heard it started in my room, until all the roof flew away. The entire floor upstairs was flooded with rainwater, and I feared my clothes would be thrown away.
My mother told us someone offered us a place for rent, but my family refused because there was no water (we strangely had water at home). I asked them where they slept and they said under the stars. I did not understand when they told me they would rather stay at home. They said we would just utilize the money for rent to rebuild the house.

But I insisted. I offered to pay for the rent. I realized we need another house for at least a month to properly sleep, celebrate Christmas and New Year’s Day, my mother’s and my niece’s birthday.

When we checked the place, it was really good. So, it became a done deal.
My mother cleaned the house the next day and transferred our stuff.
Eventually, it was easy settling in.

BANGON CEBU

I went to the North of Cebu to check the condition. There was water, power, and signal. I bought four bottles of drinking water so I could bring it to the city.

I spent the rest of week at our new rented place, completely detached from the world (social media, I mean). But I was able to travel the roads well enough to see how bad the condition really is. At home, I picked up few of my things I could scavenged, grabbed books I wanted to read, and actually read them.

There were a lot of things I missed and lost. But what was important was we were safe, and that in itself matters that most.

It has been more than a week since Super Typhoon Rai, locally known as Odette, swept the island of Cebu. Slowly, we are able to pick ourselves up – but there is still a long way to go.
And oh, we have new puppies from our dog.

CEBOOM 2.0

I heard that this wasn’t the first time Cebu experienced this intense calamity. On 1981, Typhoon Ruping caused extreme havoc. Cebu was not livable that time – no water, no power, nothing.

When the local government asked help from the national government, they were declined (I’m not sure how true this is) because budget was scarce from the rehabilitation of other areas affected by other typhoons months before.

Eventually, the local governments committed to rebuild Cebu on their own and make it way better then before. It become the start of Ceboom, which eventually became a term for Cebu’s rapid rise in urbanization and booming economy.
There was a talk in History repeating itself.

The National Government has spent a lot on COVID-19 response, and there’s news of scarce budget for rehabilitation of the affected province. People are saying there will be Ceboom 2.0. Though the local government isn’t actually living up to these standards yet, I see the citizens living up to this.

Cebuanos were opening their establishment with generator sets for charging stations, shared extension wires, sharing water for those who had, initiated their own donation drive, and helping each other be sane. But resiliency can only do so much. Cebu needs help.

If you’d like to help, comment down and I'll reply with possible platforms of aid you could contribute to.