By Rhona Canoy

SO… The recent volcanic activity of Taal certainly has brought excitement to our country. Like any calamity, it sparks a spirit of generosity in us. We love to be good Samaritans, I suppose, to assuage our guilt at being happy it wasn’t us.

Per se, I have great admiration for people who are first to jump up off their complacent butts and spearhead these gestures. It’s usually these leaders who actually do have the heart of gold. For whatever reasons and purposes, that they feel driven to care for their fellowman and will not hesitate to reach out to the generosity of others to help the cause.

But we are seasonal Samaritans, aren’t we? I can certainly count myself among these. The people whom we wish to help face some harsh realities which we can’t do anything about, because we don’t know how. Watching the news last night, I heard one evacuee wish that the volcanic activity would be over so that she and her family could go back to their home. Which was in one of the towns on the island. Part of me felt really sad for her because she didn’t seem to realize that it is going to be a while before Taal island is declared safely habitable again.

Then I think back on the other recent calamities and the buzz of activity to help those victims. When Taal began to explode ash and rocks, the focus was then thrown on those poor displaced people. And yet there are still those in Cotabato who have not yet gotten back up on their feet after the series of terrible earthquakes and are still living in evacuation centers.

We have a terrible habit of eagerly sorting through our clothes and discarding those which we feel we can give away because we want them less than the other residents in our closets. We also eagerly go to the grocery store and find the cheapest food items on the shelves to pack into care bags and boxes. I remember during the Sendong tragedy how some flood victims commented that they were actually tired of eating sardines and noodles because that’s all that what was handed out to them every time someone wanted to help.

There are those truly helpful ones who will make the effort, time and money to provide what is truly needed. The most necessary things hardly find their way into the relief packs. New underwear, soap, shampoo, toothbrushes and toothpaste, blankets and pillows, and bags to put their belongings in. Oh, and for the women, sanitary napkins. Because the biological rhythms of nature don’t stop because of calamities.

A good friend and her group truly went out of their way to give away jerry cans for hauling water to the earthquake victims of Cotabato. And not just a few but a truckload of new containers because they understood and appreciated the need for water. They are always the first to respond, doing so quietly in the background, and also go the distance in trying to help the dislocated and disenfranchised.

There are people in Jolo who are still living in an evacuation camp several years after war decimated their villages. They’ve not had the full capacity to rebuild and re-establish their lives. And they still need some help. I suppose there is some selfish gratitude in finding ourselves escaping tragedy. Which makes us generous to some degree. But it is truly hard to feel compassion for a situation that we have never experienced.

All these survivors (for that’s what they are) have had their lives uprooted and turned upside down and all sorts of inside out. For many of us, we will never know how that feels. They have lost their homes, and some have lost loved ones. That is the most painful tragedy of all. I can’t begin to fathom how to give them the help and support they truly need.

After we send away the relief goods we made some effort to collect and pack, we are going to turn away and forget about these suffering people. We have done our due diligence, haven’t we? We helped. But only a tiny band-aid for a blood-gushing wound. These people are going to need help in getting back on their feet. Our government wants to give them loans. Kind of cruel, don’t you think?

Lending people money in times of disaster certainly isn’t help. Or assistance. What many don’t realize is that it’s actually harder to get back up on one’s feet after a disaster. The psychological and emotional impact of having your reality change drastically causes trauma which many of us are lucky never to feel. It’s not just about surviving. It’s about holding on to a reason for living.

Our geography certainly makes it more difficult to be a helpful society. It was challenging enough to get our relief goods from one point of Mindanao to another, but to get them from Mindanao to Luzon is a logistical nightmare. And our regionalism makes us a bit numb, actually. So we shuffle along, wanting to help. But not really committed to it. We certainly walked away from Sendong, didn’t we? And that was in our neighborhood. Many who took shelter in evacuation centers were lucky enough only to face tons of muck in their homes, but to go back home nevertheless. Some others had nothing and no one to go back to.

People needed homes, livelihoods, a way to start over. Yes, it’s the government’s task to do so. To build housing for those who lost them, to help create ways for them to support themselves. But maybe they also needed to feel that they weren’t pushed aside, that there was still a sense of community. I struggle with this because it is a dilemma that I don’t know how to deal with. What, really, can we do after all?

I’m still going to send care packages because that’s all I know what to do. But if someone comes up with a better idea, count me in.