FLOOD is symbolic in Christian and Judaism religions. Based on biblical story, God used flood to wipe out the bad people at the time of Noah. Only Noah, his family, and a pair of each animal survived the flood because they stayed on Noah’s famous Ark. The story presents a picture of the reward if people remain faithful to God and on the other side, it tells us the devastating effect of flood.
For almost a week, the rain has been pouring without end. I have never seen the Balili River and its outlets looking so alive and active. The only problem is the muddy color of the flowing water indicating the ceaseless drops of rain both on the lowlands and on the mountains. In national news, it is all about the overflowing of rivers, the flooding of towns, and the thousands of evacuees all over Luzon and other parts of the country. In many areas, the flood has gone over the rooftops of houses sinking cars, helpless animals, and even people. In the evacuation areas, people get sick because they are all overcrowded. Some have to bring with them their livestock. An old woman could not stop crying when she was cleaning her sewing machine sank in the flood. In was only her source of income.
In most parts of the Cordillera, the flood is not primarily a concern though City Camp Lagoon can speak otherwise. The problem here are the devastating landslides. Many roads are now hardly passable because of soil erosions. When the roads are damaged, road accidents are common, transportation is affected and so local commerce is derailed. The countless drops of rain have softened soil along roads causing them to erode and ripraps to collapse. Classes were suspended. The rain does not want to sleep even at night time.
The story that the earth was all flooded during Noah’s time may not be literally true but the idea of the flood eradicating all living beings is convincing. In the story, it rained for forty days and nights until the highest mountain was covered with water. It has been raining for almost entirely a week day and night now. In some areas, the rain is not continuous but still the flood came up. I will not go as far as telling that we are acting badly today that’s why we have flood. I can only say that we are doing something wrong to cause the flood to rise so quick.
The thing is flood kills people and all living things. People have died already because of drowning. Thousands have been forced to live in school buildings and basketball courts because their houses were half-sank. Livestock that are left behind may also end up dead. A lot people have lost their means of living and so they need to start from scratch again. The difficulties we suffer because of flood may give us an idea what kind of “hell” did the people at the time of Noah suffer, if the story was true.
Like the message of the great flood in the bible, every flood that visits us remind us of change of attitude especially towards the environment. Climate change seems like a distant concern but if we could only realize that we are now feeling the effect of it. In Manila Bay, trucks have to dispatch 26 tons of garbage. This is similar in other parts of Metro Manila. We have an unreliable drainage system in the country. They were not built to last unlike in other countries where people can go down below because they are so big. The problem is we have a problematic drainage system and we keep dumping our garbage on the streets and on rivers.
We are lucky to live in the heights of the mountains because it keeps us away from the flood. But we have not taken care of our trees so there’s nothing to hold our soil anymore. We have created our own problem by giving away our trees in exchange of technologies. We did not maintain the balance because we have chosen this technologies we label as progress over nature.
Flood is another face of mass destruction. People have no power to go against it and things can only be done to prevent it. God promised that no such thing as the great flood will happen again by putting the rainbow on the sky but it does not mean that no flood will come again. The flood we have today is our creation, not His. So, take care of the environment. It is different when we know that we have trees keeping the soil intact no matter the pour of rain. The sleep would be sounder.