Typhoon Ondoy has left for greener pastures but the devastation he left was almost too much to bear. Iloilo was not as hard hit, we had no power and no internet connection but it was only for two days. I just got back my connection and scoured the web for news and what I saw gave me goosebumps. We once lived and worked in the big city back in 2004 but we went back to Iloilo when I gave birth to my daughter. I never could raise a child in a hustle-bustle environment and from what I can see in the news and in amateur videos, I am now sure that I made the right choice.

I have friends and family in Luzon who I have not yet heard from, although I am now glad that my grandfather in Pasay survived the flood. I could not say the same for the millions of family left homeless by Ondoy, and my heart bleeds for those who have lost a loved one due to this recent onslaught of Nature. What went wrong? What really happened? Why did this happen? Is this Nature’s getback for the mindless corruption of her resources? The questions are endless, but answers are still nowhere to be found.

The Metro is full of people, and people from provinces keep on going to Metro Manila to try their luck in the big city. I for one was once part of the bandwagon but after spending a couple of years and seeing the illustrious and the infamous parts of the big city I came to realize that I could never live my life there. I’m more attuned to the slow-paced life of the province, where people are virtually untouched (almost) by technology. No skyscrapers covering the beautiful evening sky and the sun is not as harsh as it is in the Metro. I reckon, it must be because the sun was trying too hard to penetrate the smog covering the city…

My heart goes out to the people who have lost their homes, their possessions and most of all their loved ones. But instead of blaming the dam or blaming other people, they need to really think why this happened, is it because of their disregard for Mother Nature? Is it because they so heartlessly, tried to bleed out every ounce of Nature’s resources that Mother Earth had to take measures into her own hands and used a seemingly mild typhoon and turned it into a deadly Hand of Nature?

I do not have the answers to those questions, all I have are more questions. Why is this happening the world over? Is Nature finally retaliating? What can we do? Is there something we can still do for Mother Nature to rectify the damage that have accumulated over the years? Some people have already taken their stand to help protect Mother Nature, will you do the same?