wish I got a tshirt for surviving a catagory 4 typhoon on an island in the Philippines!
okay
here's some context. last Sunday around 3 am a big typhoon his (her name
is Nina shes a jerk) she has 150 mph winds. From what I heard it was so
bad the island was considered in a state of calamity. "Following
the devastation wrought by Typhoon Nina, the Sangguniang Panlalawigan
ng Marinduque has declared the entire island-province of Marinduque
under a State of Calamity. Acting on the recommendation of the
Provincial Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council (PDRRMC), the
Sanggunian under..."
anyways it pretty much
wrecked the entire island. We finally got power for a little while yesterday and water. So all week
we literally have been building houses and being disgusting. We have
been boiling water and sweating. It's probably the best part of my
mission so far.
So Monday morning. (the night
before I stocked up on food and put all my district under one house so
we could all be safe) the 5 of us woke up at 3 am to the typhoon and it
was crazy. We kept making jokes and videos all night hahahah. we only slept like
3 hours, and during that time a giant tree fell onto our door so when
we woke up we could not go outside. so we went to the kitchen and
grabbed a bunch of kitchen knives and machetes and went to work on the
tree, it took us about 3 hours before we could get out. After that we
spent all day checking the other apartments and building houses for
people around. We tried to sleep in Boac again but no power made it hard
cause it got hot as frick
A man we knew from the neighborhood was killed.
Tuesday. about the
same. We went and hauled water for one of our members to fill her
bathroom and built more roofs. They fed us boku. and it was delicious.
they finally fixed the main roads so we could go to different barangays
and check on our other apartments and luckily no damage. It was fun and
lucky the zone leader has a car which made everything so much easier, also we
went with the district leader to different areas to assess damage of
members. saw some pretty devastating stuff.(no sleep so hot)
Wednesday.
hung out at the church with some of the members as we all used the gas
generator to charge our phone and stuff. (I used a members laptop to
email my family to tell them that I'm alive) then after I packed up and left for San Pablo
because I got called to become a trainer. (luckily the ferry's were up
and running) went and slept in San Pablo (no sleep also)
Thursday.
I went and picked up my new trainee his name is elder Mismash and he is
from Utah! we hung out in Lucena mall and I ate my first real meal of
the week. Mcdonalds!!! (surviving off of ramen and water before that) then I
taught him how to like.....go to the bathroom. aaahhh the reward of
being a parent. slept in Lucena ( still no sleep cause not enough beds.)
Friday.
We finally got back to the island but waited at the port for 2 hours.
then we had a brutal 4 hour boat ride to the island. I finally I went
back to Boac to pick up my laundry. then tried to skype my family because I heard that Boac was getting reports of power in the center of town. that was a
failure it was shutting off like 5 times.
Saturday.
Finally got to call instead of skype because there were no good cameras
ahahaha then we got power in Mogpog. I finally got to sleep the night
before new years. I slept from 7pm to 6:45Am got a very fantastic 11
hours of sleep.
anyways
this week has been absolutely crazy. I have seen some awful heart
wrenching things some very bad things happen to good people and this
beautiful island got hurt. But being a part of the thing to help make it
better and help these people has been one of the best moments of my
life. I love this church and these people.
Love you all
Elder Yarro
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