The day started early as we wound our way through the chaotic maze of traffic and pedestrians to the office. We were about to begin negotiations which, if successful, would see us supplying 25,000 people with enough emergency rations for a month. This sounds a lot, until you get an email from the UN team to tell you that this morning the number of people affected by the two typhoons has risen to over 6.4 million, with over 340,000 still in 752 evacuation centres, over 500 dead and who knows how many missing - and a forecast of 5 more typhoons (of who knows what intensity) to hit the country before December 31. The good news is that the deal looks (is) solid, but now we have to purchase the items, including 250,000kg of rice, pack and deliver 25,000 individual relief packages in the space of two months.
Following these meetings we took a member of the donor organisation on a tour of one of the worst affected areas in Metro Manila which two weeks after the typhoon is still under smelly, dirty, polluted water. It was here that we met the Chair of one of the Pasig Home Owner's Associations and her husband. This older couple has been confined to the second story of their house for the past two weeks and during that time have recieved 2kgs of rice and some sardines. We came today with nothing, but they were so grateful for our visiting them. Despite their hardship we managed to laugh together and enjoy comparing stories. We had all just heard an announcement that the water was going to be pumped out of the area - "but where to", said the couple "the river has overflowed into the village, where are they going to pump the water to?"After leaving this, just one of the countless villages under water, we headed to what would have to be one of the most distressing places I have been on this deployment. 2,307 people are living in a sports centre in town, this is just one of three evacuation centres in this town with a total of over 4,000 in all three. The smells of 2,307 people, living in a confined space for over 2 weeks, assault your senses even before you get into the building. In this hot, humid, smelly basket-ball stadium cardboard is spread on the courts for beds, children and elderly are sleeping whilst chaos reigns around them. Many are stretched out in the stadium seating, while babies scream and children whinge, Mums and Dads look for ways to pacify and entertain.
The authorities are doing all they can, but there is nowhere for the majority of these people to go home to. They are the 'informal residents' those that erected squats on the sides of floodways and rivers - they have no claim to land, or now belongings: so they wait until suitable arrangements can be made. But even as we were there more people arrived from new flooding.
