Displaced #5 – Philippines
Evocative stories of people who have to leave their homes due to climate change.ie aufgrund des Klimawandels ihr Zuhause verlassen müssen
Due to Monika’s accident and the resulting concussion, we had to take it a little easier in the last few weeks of 2024 and were forced to postpone our travel plans for a while. Monika has fully recovered in the meantime, and we were both able to use December to replenish our energy reserves a little after an extremely intense year.
However, we also used the last few weeks of the year to meet partners and to continue working on the funding. After having been in close contact with Lena von Zabern from WFP Germany for months via email and calls, we were finally able to meet her in person in December when she was in Switzerland for a few days. Alongside IOM, the World Food Programme is our most important partner for this work, and Lena is our good angel at the WFP. She assured us of further logistical support at our destinations, and alternative/additional destinations were discussed, such as Iraq.
An extremely positive development also took place at the end of the year in terms of funding. We have received a very generous donation out of Lucerne, which has reduced our project deficit considerably and made it a good deal more manageable.
Cordially & see you soon
Mathias & Monika
BRASCHLER/FISCHER
+41 79 205 0330
visualimpactprojects.org
CH40 8080 8009 0719 6376 6
Hellgasse 4 – 5103 Wildegg
The new year had only just begun when we were already on the road again. Which is necessary, as we have to be finished with production in 6 months and only half of our destinations have been completed. Our first trip in 2025 took us to the Philippines, a country we had not yet traveled to, but an important destination for this project, as it is one of the five most affected countries for climate change-induced displacement. While the journey to Manila went without incident, this unfortunately changed when we were supposed to take a domestic flight from Manila to Naga in Bicol. After a long wait at the gate, we were informed that the flight had been canceled due to bad weather. Cebu Pacific Airlines naturally offered to rebook the passengers on the next available flight. However, we were quite surprised when the airline told us that this would not take place for us for another 6 days. After a longer discussion and a lot of persistence on Monika’s part, they agreed to let us fly in 4 days. As a team from the IOM was expecting us in Bicol, this was obviously not an option. And so we hurriedly made our way to the Philippine Airlines ticket office to catch the last seats on the afternoon flight to Legazpi, a town three hours’ drive from Naga. Later we were to learn that the airport in Naga is almost always closed when it rains, which would make flights there with Cebu Pacific a minor lottery win in the current rainy season.
When we arrived in Legazpi, we were met by our driver Renemarc, who had driven from Legazpi (where he lives) to Naga in the morning, only to drive back to Legazpi again and then take us on the same route for the third time in the afternoon. However, he was quite relaxed about it, as he had secretly expected to have to pick us up in Manila, which would have meant a 12-hour drive each way.
However, the increasing amount and intensity of rainfall is exactly one of the major problems in the Philippines. At the end of last year, the island state was hit by 6 consecutive typhoons, which led to flooding and destruction. And on our arrival day in Bicol it was also pouring with rain. Renemarc told us that it had been raining every day since the beginning of the year. The rainy season has become longer and more intense. The consequences of this should become very evident over the next few days.
IOM had organized for us to meet some families who had lost their homes in the typhoons. One of them was Ronalyn and Jimmy Jr with their two small children Prince Jesus and Precious Ghia. When we were on our way to the regional office in Santa Barbara to meet the couple, we drove along large expanses of water, which were not a lake as it seemed, but flooded rice fields that appeared to have no end. At the regional office, it turned out that the young Solano family, who had lost their house in Typhoon Kristin and were now living in the cabin of Jimmy Jr’s parents, were about to lose their roof over their heads for the second time. Ronalyn told us that the water was already in the house and was continuing to rise. When the community representatives offered to take us in a boat to the house in the middle of the rice fields, we immediately accepted the offer – despite some reservations from Mitzi, our great guide and translator from the IOM. She also joined us on the journey to the sinking house in the water. When she realized that Mathias was going to get into the water to film, she advised him to watch out for the snakes, which were unfortunately not visible as the water was a murky brown…
The house was actually knee-deep in water, but the three generations who lived in it were still going about their lives, moving around the house on wooden planks installed just above the surface of the water. Jimmy Jr, however, was in the process of installing an emergency tent on a small rise on the land, as the family feared that the water would continue to rise and they would then have to flee their dwelling. And so we witnessed in real time how the increasingly frequent floods are causing many Filipinos to lose not only their homes, but often also all their possessions.
Two days later, we saw another impact of the increasing rainfall: Landslides. The World Food Programme took us to Libon, where a massive landslide in October had buried the homes of dozens of families. When we saw the extent of the landslide, we understood that the community considered itself lucky that not more people had died and that “only” one person was missing.
Two interviews with mothers of large families, though, made it clear how traumatic the experience was for the people involved and how hard it must have been to lose what little they had. And although the municipality made great efforts to provide the affected families with a shelter, they found themselves resilient in very challenging circumstances. In the case of one family we visited, the accommodation of just under 15 m2 provided was occupied by 11 people. And this since the end of October.
After we had seen more than enough rain in the Philippines, fate was kind to us in the end. On our last day and off work, we experienced the beauty of the country under blue skies and bright sunshine. We were particularly happy because we were able to see the Mayon volcano, one of the most evenly shaped and impressive stratovolcanoes in the world. It had been hiding in the clouds for almost the whole week, only to show itself in all its impressive glory at the end.
