Like most families on the east side of Metro Manila, our house went underwater last September 26. This was the worst natural disaster I have ever experienced directly. I am not going to write about that day though.

The earliest typhoon I could remember is “Dading” in 1964. I was four and I distinctly remember the howling of the wind the night it hit the city. I was in my bed and looking up the ceiling wondering what the noise was all about. I remember my parents getting real worried as the storm approached. There was no power for several days.

The many write-ups about Ondoy’s onlaught last Sept. 26 brought to mind another incident. Ondoy, they said, broke a record in terms of rainfall, surpassing a 1967 downpour that flooded most of the Greater Manila area, as it was called then. Yup, 1967. I remember our house getting flooded. We had to move via a stepping stone of dining chairs as the floodwater, no more than a foot high though, inundated the first floor of our house. My dad was furious as we just bought a new refrigerator then. Luckily though, it wasn’t damaged.

The all-time most destructive typhoon, in terms of wind strength, was Yoling in 1970. Code named internationally as “Patsy”, the typhoon struck mid-November, just a week after my lola died. On the way to Holy Cross Memorial Park the day after Yoling hit, there was nary a house with an intact roof along Baesa in Quezon City. It was utter devastation. Power was off for two maybe three weeks.

Almost forgot, the earthquake that toppled the Ruby Tower in Manila – August 2, 1968. I was 8 and in a daze when my mom woke me up 2 maybe 3 am with the whole house shaking. I wasn’t really scared, I was just figuring out what was happening. I remember the live TV feed from the felled buildings. My father, who’s never the religious guy, went to church with us in tow the Sunday after that.

Here’s something not most people remember. April 7, 1970, 1:34 pm, an intensity 7 earthquake hit the metropolis. It was terrifying in that it was the first earthquake I’ve experienced wide awake. My brother and I were watching an old Tagalog movie on Channel 5. When Van de Leon slapped Lolita Rodriguez and she fell to the floor, the tremor struck. Everything around us went shaking wildly and I held on to my brother like mad. Though damage and casualties were few, it prompted a movie producer to make a movie, “Intensity 70”, with Novo Bono Jr. and Sahlee Quizon, if I’m not mistaken.

There was a scene in “All the President’s Men” where Jason Robards playing Ben Bradlee of the Washington Post was brainstorming with his staff on what news items should be included in an issue of the paper. One quipped “31 days of continuous rains in the Phillipines attributed to the theft of the statue of the child Jesus.” Let me tell you something, Ondoy was a picnic compared to those 31 days in July-August of 1972.

The 30+ day downpour started, and I cannot forget this, on my birthday July 18. It was fairly overcast that morning and so right after classes, my brother treated me to a movie in Avenida. We saw John Wayne’s “The Green Berets.” That afternoon, when we left the theater, it started. It was the proverbial “cats and dogs” kind of rain. And there was no let-up until a month later. Imagine if that will happen today.

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