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NSTP Kwentuhan 2019

Recently, I’ve been given a task which introduced to me an aspect of my environment which I never paid any attention to, a part of the community that I was never interested in since I have always followed all the rules imposed and was never interested in any of the community activities in our area, i also preferred doing what i wanted by myself and avoid the need to rely on others.

I have been given the task of visiting a barangay hall and asking what their plans are during disasters, what they do to manage possible hazards in their community, and what trainings and/or seminars they conduct within the community to arm their people with the appropriate knowledge and experience to handle whatever disaster may come their way.

Since I had no time to go back home, I just decided to explore the communities near my dorm and to find the nearest barangay hall to conduct my interview. It was early morning when I decided to start my hunt for a barangay hall where I am to conduct an interview, I thought to myself, “those near my dorm must have been interviewed by hundreds of us already since it is so close to the university”, I wanted to be unique , that’s why I decided I want to search far and wide, high and low, I even reached areas far enough that I should have just taken a jeepney to get there in the first place, but to no luck, all barangay halls always had an alibi, “ay sorry po ser, may pinuntahan po si mam e”, “sori ser, tanod lang po ako dito”, “balik ka nalang mamaya, hindi pa siya dumadating e”, “di pa po bukas yung barangay hall”. In the end, desperation was starting to take hold of me, I went back to the streets near UST and lo and behold, the barangay hall at the back of our university was prepared and complete with all the information I needed to ask regarding their plans during disasters. “Kailangan sa school?” an official asked me, “Opo sir” I said, “Pang-55 na ata kayo sa mga nagtanong sa amin sa nakalipas na araw”…….. I knew it.

So there I was about to conduct my interview when the baranggay official just said “picturan nyo nalang ito oh, nagpaprint na kami ng listahan kasi masyadong marami nagtatanong sa amin, sayang lang sa oras kung interview pa kasi lahat naman ng sasabihin namin e pareparehas lang at nakasulat na dito”. I was handed a thick folder, close to bursting, it looked like it has been through two world wars already. The folder might have not looked much but it has indeed served its purpose of protecting the folder’s contents, the folder contained information regarding to what to do during specific kinds of disasters and also different reminders, projects, and inventories of equipment that the barangay currently had. After taking pictures of all the pages in the folder, next I was handed a small pad of paper stapled together which looks like a typical, regular notepad, except that it was the exact opposite of the folder, this pad of paper was wet in some areas making some of the writing on it smudged, the pad of paper contained the different role assignation for each person who had a responsibility in the barangay and also their own respective tasks. 

After taking photos of the two sources of information, I asked them if I can take a picture with them as proof of my interview before I went my way; I also took a photo of the community CCTV monitors before going.

 As I went home and reviewed the photos I took of the folder and the small pad of paper, I realized that the info I was expecting to see were complete, but the info I expected was incomplete and that there were more information in the barangay’s DRRM plan that has totally slipped my mind. It was a great eye opener for me since I never thought that a barangay which didn’t look that rich was able to provide such luxuries when it comes to emergency equipment.

I have to be honest; I didn’t think that the barangay near my area were able to provide those kinds of equipment, maybe because I was too judgmental or maybe because media influenced the way I see the current situation of our country which made me generalize everything about our country. That community’s barangay hall was prepared for most of the common disasters that strike all communities; they were prepared for fire disasters, they taught their people fire safety tips and reminders of what to do and what not to do during common disasters, they had plans on what to do if ever flooding occurs in the area, and they had emergency transportation and teams ready to go on the signal.

One problem I saw was I didn’t seem to notice any plans or information regarding on what to do or what to prepare for problems such as power outages and trash management, they seem to focus on the after rather than on the prevention of the problem or hazard. Another thing I noticed was the lack of discipline the people in the community had regarding the proper disposal of their trash, sure, you can say that the weekly clean-up drive would make up for that, but would they need a weekly cleanup drive if they just throw their trash in the right places? A possible reason I could think of is that it is not the people in the community’s fault but instead the people PASSING through the community.

This kind of thinking can actually be applied to the entire country if you think about it. Why is there a need to implement hundreds of rules if all of it would become unnecessary because of a single prevention? These cleanup drives and fines could all be unnecessary if everyone, not just those people living in the community would take responsibility for their own trash and where they throw it. It is actually amazing how this activity enlightens the students to their community’s condition; it’s also interesting in a way since it tells us that our own communities do have their own priorities and that we should first see concrete evidences before going straight to conclusions. This activity opens the eyes of the students to the small problems our communities experience every single day, and each of these small problems that aren’t given any attention would contribute to a bigger problem in the future which would eventually lead to the formation of a possible disaster in the community. By informing citizens at a young age, they are already made aware of the multitude of problem their community might be facing, this can encourage them to think of unique or alternative ways of trying to solve problems in the community and not just rely on the older people of the community to think of the solutions. If I was asked what I could contribute for the betterment of the condition of my community, I would suggest focusing on prevention instead of action regarding problems, this way, we wouldn’t need to think of different programs that deals with a problem that has happened already, we would only need to think of fewer programs that deals with PREVENTING that problem from happening.