Basyang’s Bashings

I love storms.

They make people realize (even for just a few days or hours) how puny we are compared to nature.

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9:00 AM

Yesterday, because Basyang hit the metro so fiercely and so swiftly, the weather began to normalize—but not the rehabilitation of things she destroyed. Wanting to do something productive amidst brown-out, I went to PNU to get some papers to check. My plan was clear: 1. go to PNU; 2. get papers; 3. proceed to a coffee shop 4. buy their cheapest product; 5. check papers; and 6. re-charge phone. But not all plans turn into practice. It appears many people had the same idea, and when I went to SM Manila, it’s packed with people trying to escape reality.

I didn’t give up. SM’s kind of small, so I went to Robinson’s Manila, only to find out that the situation’s the same.

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REALIZATION #1: Technology has enslaved us; we have become too dependent on them.
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I had a moment of reminiscing. I suddenly missed home. When we were kids, we usually spend the day chatting, playing the guitar, and singing songs (not that we want the storm to return). At night, our family would usually play scrabble in candle lights (from which Papa would cheat, hiding the difficult tiles.

2:00 PM

Realizing the futility of my plans, I decided to just go to the hardware to buy a rechargeable lamp with AM-FM Radio. The scene shocked me. It looks like those Apocalyptic films that show paranoid people panic-buying.

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REALIZATION #2: People in the metro lack survival skills during brown-outs.
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I am guilty of this, I have succumbed to this pathetic nature of urban-dwellers. Back home, we usually just create makeshift lamps from old socks (or clothes) and gin bottles. Yeah, it emits black smoke, but we didn’t mind because we only use that as a substitute for candles, and we only use them for a short period of time—we sleep early.

6:00 PM

As darkness lurked metro, I noticed people scouring around, looking for an “activity” to do for the long dark night; some bought cases of beer, some looked for computer shops with generators, while some flooded coffee shops and fastfood chains.

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REALIZATION #3: We have turned the day into night and the night into day.
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I will never forget that line from Kurosawa’s “Dreams”. When a city guy went to a remote rural village, he asked an old man why there’s no light in village at night, from which the old man gently answered, “Why? Isn’t it supposed to be dark at night?” Indeed, modern technology has brainwashed us. It made us think that we can alter nature, that we can turn day into night and vice versa. But in reality, we can’t; we never can.

***

God created storms, and God loves His creations. Ergo, He loves storms.

They help Him make us realize (even just for a few days or hours) how powerless we are.