Out of Tacloban

On behalf of the Jimenez clan and of the Lastrillas clan in Leyte, let me express our gratitude to Inquirer reporter Nikko Dizon, who has been covering Supertyphoon “Yolanda” and its aftermath even before the lashing winds and storm surge turned Tacloban into a wasteland.

Readers might recall the story I told previously of how my aunt, Francisa “Ansing” Lastrillas Jimenez, who is in her 90s, was finally found in Tacloban, putting to rest our worst fears and anxieties.

Well, Tita Ansing is now in Manila and by now she should be reunited with about 21 of her nieces and nephews whom she refused to leave behind in her ruined home city.

It was Nikko who finally found Tita Ansing and handed her the note given by my niece Kara Magsanoc Alikpala urging her to evacuate if she could to Manila. It was also the intrepid Nikko who arranged to bring the surviving Lastrillases to the airport and there arrange for transport to Manila.

The arrangements were far from easy, as no doubt everyone knows, judging from the crowds that had gathered and the panic and confusion in the first days after the disaster. Nikko convinced Air Force personnel to take Tita Ansing (who is nursing a wound in her foot) and two companions (a nephew and a niece who are both nurses) aboard a cramped C-130 bound for Cebu. From there they took a Philippine Airlines flight to Manila.

As for the rest of the Lastrillases, they camped out for more than three days at the airport waiting to fly to Manila. They are all expected to arrive today, via Cebu. Tita Ansing’s family here, meanwhile, have been relaying food, mats, blankets, clothes and other necessities as the evacuees literally had nothing but the clothes on their backs when they arrived. My cousin Frank Mangonon told me that they had to make emergency purchases of rubber slippers because the Tacloban folk were barefoot when they deplaned.

Anyway, our lasting gratitude to Nikko, for, in the words of Letty Jimenez-Magsanoc, this paper’s editor in chief, “going way above and beyond the call of duty” to search for, contact and escort Tita Ansing and her relatives out of Tacloban. She even handed the group some money, as they were literally barefoot and penniless.

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Not everyone in Tita Ansing’s family was saved. A niece, Lourdes, was trapped inside their house when the storm surge hit, and she had a hard time clambering out because by then the doors could hardly be opened. Her cousins and siblings were able to retrieve her after a few minutes, but Lourdes succumbed soon after.

Tita Ansing herself was making her way out of the door when the water suddenly rose from her knees to nearly her chest. She clung to the walls and managed to climb up a dining table where nephews found her and carried her out of the house. She stayed for the next few days in a gazebo in her backyard with other members of the family.

“I am losing my faith in God!” she wails to whoever comes to pay her a visit in her condominium in Manila.

She recalls facing the image of the Santo Niño as she was perched atop the dining table and uttering invectives at it. Reminded that God loved her enough to spare her and enable her to make it to Manila, she says, through tears: “But imagine what I saw as I was going to the airport. The destruction! All the dead bodies!”

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Tacloban is considered a “second hometown” of our branch of the Jimenez family tree, which originates in Sorsogon, Sorsogon. But since my Lolo Ponso crisscrossed the archipelago as a local treasurer, my aunts and uncles were born and grew up in different places. But Tacloban (along with Bohol) will always be considered special because this was where most of them spent their adolescence and where they met their life partners.

Thus it was in Tacloban where my uncle Titong met the young Ansing during World War II. They decided to get married after a short courtship but their marriage was even briefer, lasting barely longer than a month before Tito Titong was killed in an ambush.

It was also in Tacloban where our oldest aunt, Carol Jimenez Pascual, met and married Dr. Reginaldo Pascual, our Tito Nalding. My cousin Pat Mangonon says that many Pascual relatives have not been accounted for yet, although they received news that the Pascual hometown outside Tacloban was not too badly hit.

Another uncle, Tio Toto, also married a Tacloban native, Carina “Dida” Quintero Jimenez, who passed away this year. Tio Toto’s children are still waiting for word about their Quintero relatives, especially an elderly uncle.

In an earlier column, I also mentioned that helping in the search for Tita Ansing was Nicco Villasin, son-in-law of my cousin Butch Jimenez and his wife Pilar. Nicco happens to be a provincial board member of Leyte but he flew to Tacloban for personal reasons, too. Latest word is that the Villasins, including Nicco’s father and grandfather, are now making their way to Cebu and thence to Manila.

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For the annual Christmas party that she throws for friends in the media, Pangasinan Rep. Gina de Venecia requested that all the guests bring with them relief goods for the survivors of Yolanda.

I happened to mention this to my daughter-in-law, Tesh Mission David, and the next day, Tesh called me to say that she and her workmates, the ladies of the Regional Data Entry Services (RDES) of Amadeus, an international travel company, had on their lunch break bought six boxes of relief goods. These were delivered to the Department of Social Welfare and Development where, it is hoped, they are helping the victims. Many, many thanks!