We had experienced this weekend the fury of mother nature. Our country had been devastated by the storm Ondoy which the amount of rainfall for two days is something that weather forecasters claimed is equivalent to a month’s worth. Filipinos had been used to typhoons, and many assumed that Ondoy would just be jotted as one that will visit the country. In this complacency, many were surprised that the havoc that this storm created which caused them their houses, possessions and even worst, their loved ones.
What will make Ondoy unforgettable is the scale of its effect on the people who I know and the places that I often go to. A number of my relatives, friends and colleagues had narrated how the level of flood had been alarmingly fast to rise and that there was no way to save all of their belongings. Rosario, Pasig, which is the gateway out of Rizal, had been submerged underwater and the exodus of people trying to cross it was really surreal. TV footages of people’s struggle for survival and the aftermath of the disaster show how powerless we are against Earth’s wrath.
But people tend to have a short memory. Ondoy should not be a tragedy that will just be a part of our country’s gloomy history of disasters. This should call for preventive measures against flash floods and landslide, not reactive by telethons to raise funds; good urban planning, not to scamper to rescue stranded residents from their shanties or two-story houses and protection of our environment not plundering it until our planet can’t bear it anymore.
In just a week, several more disasters occurred, the earthquakes in Indonesia and Tonga and the tsunami in Samoa. These are obvious warnings that our planet is in the verge of break down. It is on its limit, refusing to take any more abuse from its inhabitants, it is striking back at us exponentially on how we treated it badly.
No comments:
Post a Comment