It’s 3:42 in the afternoon and the sky is all golden with the clouds basking in the afternoon sunshine. The trees still have their mighty bows and the ground is dry. Seems to me the typhoon Pablo or Bopha has never passed by Cebu.
The weather forecast and hush-hush built up a gloomy and almost apocalyptic preview of what’s to come with Pablo. Science people were stating that this is the most powerful typhoon to hit the Philippines this year. While we were anxiously anticipating the arrival of Pablo, the weather was actually calm, the rain moderate since yesterday. The heavens resembled more the monsoon season than a Filipino Frankenstorm.
The boys were pestering me since yesterday asking questions like, “Has it come yet?”. However, except for the cold damp wind and moderate winds yesterday lunch time there was nothing stormy about it. We are thankful that the storm did not lash out its fury on Cebu. Our hearts go out however to the people of Mindanao who took the beating most as they lay directly on the storm’s destructive path.
We have been praying for the community of Don Bosco Mati who were the first to “welcome” the storm into Philippine soil.
After all the storms that passed through the Philippines in my lifetime nothing is more memorable to me than Ruping which hit Cebu hard.
The increasing strength of tropical cyclones however is worrying and indicative of climate change. Nothing is more fearsome than UN’s chief saying that extreme weather conditions are the new ‘normal’.
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