Typhoon after typhoon, staying Bicol nearly a year

It will be nearly a year to stay in Bicol region. One of realization is that this region experiences quite number of typhoons per year.

I know this because I learned from weather forecast when I stayed in other parts of the Philippines and persons from this region told me so. But it is, of course, different from just listening their stories and experiencing the events. Here is what I observed and thought after typhoon.

People here struggle because of damage cased by this but seems accept (actually no choice) it as a part of their life.  

Many typhoons

Neighboring chicken is seeking refuge during typhoon :)

Typhoon Grenda(July),Luis(September), Ruby(December) and Amang(January) brought certain damage to my residential area last and beginning this year. Damages to property and crops are very obvious.

It is sort of very depressing event. In fact, after typhoon Grenda, houses and crops were damaged and experienced more than a week brownout in my area. If your business needs electronic power, you may lessen your earnings. Not all shops has generator.  

Recent typhoon Amang, all newly planted rice seedling is deeply under water. I hope flood water will be subsided very soon and no damage cased.

My residential place is basin, which means all water gather from neighboring areas. That is the main reason I often experience the flood. Now I have to pass the flooded water to go to city or town proper.

Blessing of the rain

But there are some group of people/animal enjoy this situation.

Children!

After typhoon passed, I often heard children play in the flooded water. They have paddle and sail to the lake like flooded rice field. And they jump into the rice field and swim there.

One time, I saw parents brought their children to our flooded area after typhoon and let them swim in the "free swimming pool". The flooded water became their entertainment.

Especially, after typhoon, electricity in the area is usually cut off. Children cannot watch TV or engage something need electronic energy.

To be honest, I do not think it is safe water because water comes from stream to which domestic water goes and rice field which used pesticide. I worry about their health but who can stop them? I see very joyful site.

Ducks too.

Once water level was raised, Ducks come to my back door which faces to the stream. They stay there during the flood to fish and rest.

I often see him (sometime more than one but usually only one duck) then, I gave him name. "Ducky"...it is not so unique name but I slowly develop emotional attachment to "Ducky".

More typhoons to come... What we do?

Coming years, not only this region and Visayas, entire Philippines may possibly  experience extreme weathers because of climate change which was also mentioned by Pope Francis during his Philippines visit.

We cannot divert the rote of typhoon once it is formed yet, there must be something we can do for the climate change. These knowledge is somehow technical and professional domain. So it seems layman has nothing to do.

But if we understand this is as changing bit of the view of life, we may not think doing something to the climate change or environment very challenging. One small step is to reconsider our consumption-simply what we buy. Lesser buy stuff you may not often use.

Here in the rural provincial setting, people are not consuming much as city(so far, I observe). But I still see many garbage of plastics from the snack, shampoo, soups and so on which affect the environment. Small packages of these product is what people can afford instead of buying big one package. I cannot say that they should not use these. ( I tried not using shampoo for past few months to see what will happen. I may write about this experiment later in another blog entry.)

Maybe starting from saying no to small plastic which is given by shop when you buy something in the market. People here used the bag made by the plant but not anymore after introducing the plastic. People's notion was changed by new invention. I may try both way, practicing old way and introducing new way. I am trying to find the way to make eco bag from the old T shirt or pant. I will post them once I finish my work.

I will welcome new idea of eco-friendly way in the Philippines setting which layman easy(or less challenging) to practice in the daily life.