Getting ‘haunted’ by the dead in Naga

UNABLE TO FORGET. Emergency responder Paul John Navales was on the scene when rescuers dug out the bodies of siblings Bianca and Michael Bersales after the landslide struck Sitio Sindulan in the City of Naga last September. The two were found dead in locked embrace. Navales, who visited their graves at the public cemetery in Barangay Naalad, says it pains him to think of what the siblings had to endure before they died. (SunStar photo/Alex Badayos)
UNABLE TO FORGET. Emergency responder Paul John Navales was on the scene when rescuers dug out the bodies of siblings Bianca and Michael Bersales after the landslide struck Sitio Sindulan in the City of Naga last September. The two were found dead in locked embrace. Navales, who visited their graves at the public cemetery in Barangay Naalad, says it pains him to think of what the siblings had to endure before they died. (SunStar photo/Alex Badayos)

JUST before he began his paramedic duties on All Saints’ Day, emergency responder Paul John Navales decided to make a quick stop at the City of Naga Public Cemetery in Barangay Naalad.

Navales wasn’t there to visit dead kin, but to visit the graves of Bianca and Michael Bersales, two victims of the deadly landslide in Barangay Tina-an last Sept. 20.

Navales, a member of Barangay Colon’s Disaster Risk Reduction and Management team, said he was one of the responders who recovered the bodies of the Bersales siblings after the landslide.

After saying a prayer for them, Navales had a chat with the siblings’ mother, Marilyn, at the cemetery.

Navales told SunStar Cebu that until now, he continues to be affected by the incident.

Remembering the retrieval

“Magbalik-balik gyud sa akong hunahuna. Dili gyud kapugngan nga mutulo ang akong luha (I can’t get it out of my mind. I can’t help but cry when I think about it),” Navales said.

Navales said it pained him to think of the hardship the siblings had to endure before they died.

He admitted it was not easy recovering their bodies due to the presence of large boulders that could move at any time if they made a wrong move.

It didn’t help that he and his fellow rescuers could hear cries for help from underneath them.

Navales said he never thought that such a disaster would befall his city.

“Abi lang gyud nako nga sa salida ra nako makita siya, pero nahitabo gyud siya nato (I thought it could only happen in the movies),” he said.

Aside from Navales, Myrna Yapac also visited the public cemetery in Naalad to pray for the souls of her three children who died in the landslide.

Yapac, 47, a public school teacher, lost her daughters Shellamae, Siena and son Edgardo Jr. when the landslide struck their house in Sitio Sindulan.

Yapac said Shellamae was set to graduate with honors in March. Her school, the Cebu Technological University, gave Shellamae a posthumous honor before she was buried last month.

Until now, Yapac said, she still could not get over the fact that her three children are gone. However, she feels them watching over her, her husband and their two sons who survived.

One of her sons told her he earlier felt their presence when he was taking an exam. He believes they guided him.

Despite her loss, Yapac said she still wants to live for her remaining children.

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