Amid the Ashes

This post is dedicated to the story of the Taal eruption... I know I have updated here and there but I thought I would give a post about the experience, many people have expereinced much worse than this with much more traumatic, but I now understand what its like to be evacuated suddenly or have a fear about what could happen or whether or not you are safe. 

It was Sunday January 12, 2020, the morning brought blue skies and sun.  I hadn’t slept well the night before, restless.  Perhaps the full moon, PJ was restless too.  I had been feeling tired since Christmas and New Years.  Immediately after our church service all I wanted was a nap.  Later in the afternoon when I came back over to Safe all the safe girls started emerging from their own siestas, during this time  one of the staff’s daughters was looking on her phone and exclaimed “Taal just erupted!” and showed us the picture online.

I have talked about Taal in previous posts, its one of the things that makes Tagaytay famous. It's supposedly the world's smallest active volcano, but I learned later its size is less visible since its a flat volcano and goes deep.  I have climbed the mountain twice, once with Safe Refuge and once in November with Isaac and ate Rosanna.  The last time the volcano erupted was 1991
                                                               
                                                                me at the  crater of Taal in November

Now I guess the news of the eruption should have alarmed me, I mean sure the very thing that makes it famous is that its small, but I mean its still a volcano.  However my i initial reaction was excitement that I would get to be around when Taal exploded, something I could tell my grandkids.  When someone would mention the 2020 eruption I could say "I was there,".  I also figured if it was going to get dangerous there would be people knocking on our door telling us to evacuate, like they do when forest fires take over provinces in Canada.   So rather relaxed I continued my day. About an hour later, we heard something on the roof, it sounded like Hail, but the Philippines doesn’t get hail, at least not as far south as we are.  Upon investigation we realized it was little volcanic rock, giving off a strong sulfur smell.

 Then we were able to see the grey plume rising above the city. A growling sound started.   We figured it was thunder but it was actually the mountain itself making its presence known; as if sending off a warning to all those nearby. In addition to the volcanic pebbles, sludgy ash like rain was falling and getting thicker. The plume turned an orange color, which was probably just the evening sun but it looked intimidating in real life. 

 you'd would thing we would start getting worried about this point but at least I was pretty relaxed still,  again figuring someone would let us know if we should evacuate.  I also think I thought that for some reason it would all be over in the morning, as if it was a typhoon or storm. 

We needed masks so two of the girls went out into the ash falling night with umbrellas to find some, but everywhere was out of stock.  Aaahhh!!! So that was a bust.  I cut up one of the kids old shirts so I could make the children a cloth mask and some of the girls used clothes or scarves to cover their faces. 

Lighting started appearing in the plume from the volcano, something I have only ever seen in books.    The power went off at about 7:30 not surprising considering and we soon lost our water. The lighting was getting intense by then, streaking the night sky with an unnatural looking hue, of course it is exactly that; Nature.  It flashed large bright orange angry looking streaks among the pillar of ash; it sent shivers down my spine.

We looked everywhere for our candles we bought at Christmas but couldn’t find them anywhere, we found one flash light and I brought mine.  The ash was falling to the point we had to use umbrellas to go out and a covering of ash was forming on the ground.   I decided to sleep at Safe that night, ate Red called and told everyone to prepare a beg in case we had to leave.  The staff, ate H, and I shone flashlights and helped get people packing; telling them to not worry and just bring what they needed for three days.


I brought PJ over to sleep in the study room with me, I was starting to feel a little concerned at this point and didn’t feel like leaving PJ on his own, silly I know, but anyway that’s what I did.  ate Red called again to say she was making plans to find a way to evacuate us because the air was going to get bad really fast.  Although I was feeling edgy I didn't feel in actual danger so I expressed that we didn't need to worry saying "There is nothing we can do tonight anyway".  The only thing I wanted to do was get everyone sleeping.

 Finally Everyone settled in for the night and I made a bed for myself in the study room, while PJ gleefully hunted for cockroaches.
Not long after I laid down I felt the table next to me shake, I thought it was PJ causing trouble but realized he was on the other side of the room.  I had felt tremors before but not like this.  I could hear all the furniture shaking and could feel it in my bones, it would increase and then fade away,  It wasn’t so strong that anything fell, but it was enough to make me feel concerned.  It disturbed the ground because I could hear water bubbling into the old CR (bathroom) next to me. 

I lay down again, and then I felt it a second time and third,  I moved into the main room to sleep and after hearing PJ whine I brought him out and put him on my chest, I knew he must have been scared because he stayed there for probably about an hour.  I kept thinking  of some movie I watched when I was kid about a Volcano erupting, I think it was about Mt, St Helen.  All the sudden the experience was no longer exciting like it had been several hours before, I wondered if the tremors would get worse, would cracks begin to form in the ground? would things start falling? I was praying but kept thinking about how many people who pray die in natural disasters.... anyway you can see how ones thought spiral out of control.  But sometime during all of this I felt this peace surround me and sensed that God was going to hold up the roof of the house.  By the time PJ got restless I felt better to move back to the study room.  The earth quakes continued all night.  At 4:30 the earth seemed to shake extra hard and I gave up on sleep. soon all the kids were awake too and were all getting scared.  Ate Red called again telling us we should try to get to Amadeo (a part of the city further down the road,) as the road to Tagaytay was closed, no cars could get in.  I started feeling a little panicked then, we were stuck.   We started making calls and ate H. went out to find a jeep.   The sun had come up by then and the ash was less.  There is something about the dawn of a new morning that gives hope to most situations.

ash fall seen the morning of January 13th

A lot of random things happened then, we found a jeep who said they could take us to Amadeo, ate Rosanna arrived with her daughter, and brought power banks so we could charge our phones, one of the girls and I went to ate L's place (our former resident) to tell her and her kids to come with us, she was eager to join our group.  The next few hours involved ate Rosanna and I sitting outside safe surrounded by ash as we couldn’t get signal inside.  Our phones were constantly typing and chiming as we worked out a plan with our staff in Manila, ate Naomi in the USA and us in Tagaytay as to how to get us out.  By this time the sun was shining and there was blue sky.  Ate Rosanna and I started questioning the idea of needing to evacuate, we tried to get more info about what the volcano was doing but everything was vague.  The sun had seemed to take all my fear away. However both ate Naomi and ate Red insisted we leave despite ate Rosanna and I being hesitate to vacate.  I was thinking of just letting everyone else go and I would stay behind, but ate Naomi said I really should go.   Around this time we got news that another ministry in Manila Samaritana  Transformational Ministries wanted to take all of us in, for free!!!   

I was still struggling with the idea of leaving and to be honest it came down to me not wanting to leave my cat, I know I know he is just a cat and our lives are more important I know it truly.  But when I realized that I couldn't being him with us, and that I had no viable options for him to stay with anyone it hit me hard, and along with the combination of being so tired I had a good 30 second breakdown.  Despite the fact he is only a cat, PJ has been one of the few constants in my life since being at Safe, Something kind of solid I can hold when things feel uncertain and days have been hard.  But after my mini breakdown I felt clearheaded and knew he would be ok on his own for a few days 

By this time, two ministries volunteered to each bring a van to get us.  Before this we had had a hard time finding people to come get us because the roads were muddy and slippery with ash and few people willing to drive them.  But the people that came were more than willing and didn't even charge us gas.  we didn't even really know them, they heard about our problem and came to our rescue.
When we got word the vans were near I went over to my house to make sure I had everything.  It’s a strange thing packing for an evacuation, I kept thinking of those mind games where people ask "if your house was burning and you have to take one thing what do you bring?" the idea behind this is to acknowledge what is really important in your life.  I have less respect for those games now because in that moment you can't remember whats important or what you might need.  I spent several minutes just standing in the middle of my house at a total blank not sure what to grab.  Thanks to my mother's instructions over the years in regards to packing, all I could really think of was underwear.  The two other things of importance I thought to grab was my laptop because its one of the few things I own that’s worth a lot and  one piece of jewelry with an important meaning.  of course PJ was the only thing I wanted to take.  Instead I made sure he had three sources of water and left out several plates of food.  Before I left the house I stroked his face and told him I’d be back and prayed that God would keep him safe. 

Ate Red arrived with the second van, she looked at us from the doorway with incredible relief she hadn’t slept the night before because she was calling people trying to get us out.  This wasn’t ate Red’s first rodeo, she had experienced an eruption before and all she wanted to do was get her girls to safety.  We loaded the vans with women and children  along with a beg of rice, fish that we had cooked and meat, due to the fridge not having power.  ate Rosanna brought a whole bunch of pork ribs she was saving for next week’s birthday parties, she refused to lose it so we brought it along. 

As we left Tagaytay we looking at the once green trees now covered in brown ash and the roads with thick mud all pushed to the side, we expected to be gone no more than a few days....what we didn't know was that we would not be returning to that building to live...

                                                     in the van during our evacuation

The vans took us right to Samaratana. I guess I had been expecting a sort of crude make up, a hostel sort of thing, but instead we entered a haven.  Samaritana helps women learn new skills, gives them jobs and reaches out to them for physical and spiritual needs and their building also works as a retreat center.  They gave us four beautiful rooms, all with a working Bathroom and hot water and  A/C I think we all thought we were entering a palace!   The staff converged and figured out our next plan, early supper and early bed, we learned about the schedule of our new place so we wouldn’t be in the way, ate Rosanna and I went over rules with the girls and  two other ates went to the market to get us some food and we ate soon after they got back. The girls were so hungry by then. 

The next few days were a whirlwind of trying to control children and keeping them from wrecking havoc, I constantly felt I was "No," "What are you doing?"   "You can't do that." and "Say Sorry"


We took them to some nearby parks so everyone could run and relax,  ate Charisa and ate Grace debriefed the girls about their emotions involving everything and some of us staff got debriefed by one of the head of Samaritana, which was very helpful.

a few days turned into a week as the volcano was still unstable, ate L went back to Tagaytay to check on her own cats and feed mine.  days continued, lots of meetings and trying to make plans despite not knowing what tomorrow would bring.  One day we made arrangements for some of us to go back to Tagaytay to get all the important documents talk to the school and get some more clothes for the girls.  We had had some donated items to keep us going up to that point.  I decided I was going to being PJ back with me that day, Samaritana said I could as long as he stayed in a cage.  We arrived back late and I put PJ in a cage that had been purchased just for the occasion, he hated it and did everything he could to get out.  I went to bed thinking I had made a mistake bringing him.  But the next morning after handing it over to God I woke up with a possible solution.  I called my missionary friends from Quazon city who I knew had cats and asked if they could take PJ for a little bit. She said Yes.  I took PJ over a few hours later since they didn't live too far away and ended up staying the whole day.  They fed me, let me sleep I watched a movie with them and for the first time since evacuating felt completely calm and peaceful.

That experience reminded me that God provides for even the tiny creatures, how much more does he provide for his children.

The house of Safe Refuge was deemed unsafe, IJM sent an engineer with ate Red to check it out and they found cracks all throughout the floor and even on the walls, so we decided we needed to find a new house right away. Meanwhile we were working to find a school for the kids to go to temporally,  which was proving challenging.   after a week and half the alert level for the volcano went from 4 to 3, we decided to send the college and senor high students back with ate Rosanna to stay with her since transferring schools for them would be tricky.  This had the sad effect of separating three families, two sets of sister and one of our staff from one of her daughters.   We finally made arrangements for the other kids to attend a nearby school.  we continued searching for houses, the weeks went by.  I had decided to delay my trip to Kalinga, but as time continued and no house was found, and as we realized we wanted the kids to finish out the school year in Manila (so they wouldn't have to switch schools again) I realized I had to decide how long I would delay my move.  I spent time in prayer and so did my prayer partners and the conclusion was that I should not delay very long and certainly not wait until the end of the school year (which is March here) so the new moving day was set for February 25th.

I went to Tagaytay to help ate Rosanna out when she had to leave for a few days, its a small house she has but everyone managed to fit by sleeping cross ways on the beds.  I packed up my house with ate Rosanna and one of the other girls and we worked at the Safe building to get rid of old junk and donated quite a few items. 

I went back to Manila to say my goodbyes there and meanwhile ate Red and ate Rosanna finally found a house! smaller than our current one but better quality.  when I came back to Tagaytay I brought PJ with me and could not thank my friends enough for taking care of him.  They had not just taken care of my pet but had provided a place of respite when i needed it.  Its amazing how God brings people into your life to feel like angels sent to minister to you.  I am beyond grateful to that family.  I said my final goodbyes to everyone and the morning of the 25th I said goodbye to Safe Refuge International and began my new journey towards Tabuk Refuge of Hope International.

It felt strange to leave Safe when they are still unsetteled but I knew God was saying it was time for me to take the next step and that he would take care of Safe Refuge.  They still need lots of prayer, ate Red is very unwell so please pray for her, the moving process is not an easy one and the staff are overworked and tired.

God taught me a lot through the Taal experience and caused all the staff to learn to trust him even when we felt frustrated.  I love the song "Waymaker," and the part that goes "even when I don't see it you're working, even when I don't feel it you're working."  I really felt this throughout this journey, sometimes I wanted to yell during those times when we couldn't find a new house and weren't sure what the best decision was, "God where are you?" but as I look back I can see how God was working all along,  sometimes we just can't see it at the time.  those are the times that our trust in him is tested, will we trust Him even if he is not working as fast or in the way we would like? will we trust him when we don't understand his ways?  will we trust him in the eruptions of our lives, literal and figurative?  Its easy to trust when things are going our way or when things make sense, real trust is when we can't see the big picture or understand it, but knowing that God sees and understands the whole thing.

Thank you all for your prayers during this time,  please keep Safe Refuge and the staff in them, even though I am not with them right now I will keep you updated.  The next time I post I will tell you more about the new ministry ate Cheryl, Ellora and I will be starting this year.

May God Bless you
thesheepishmidwife