Flood Waters

If there ever was a clear, consistent memory I have of my childhood days in Lianga, it would have to be of how predictably rainy and stormy were the months of December and January. I can easily recall many instances when my siblings and I would be huddled together most of the time for days on end in the living room of the family house, shivering from the delicious cold despite having thick blankets wrapped around us while outside the tightly closed window shutters the winds howled madly and the rain poured down in vicious and seemingly never ending torrents.

During those days in the early 1970's and until just a couple of years ago, the primitive gravel roads and the wooden timber bridges that were the norm in this part of the country were extremely vulnerable to harsh weather conditions and floods.  That meant that travelling around the province and the region was not only hazardous but prone to long delays as excessive rainfall turned gravel roads to viscous mud traps and flash floods washed away bridges or caused landslides that would block critical road sections for days.

Going back to school in Cebu after the Christmas holidays at that time was, more often than not, a logistically troublesome and dicey proposition as well as mind-numbing, physically challenging ordeal.  Not only has one have to deal with flooded roads and washed out bridges but also with cancelled airplane flights and, if one really had no choice but to endure it, a wave tossed and stormy night at sea on-board any of the small inter-island ferry ships brave enough to make the sea crossing to the Visayas.

No Dingy, Little Town

A dingy, little town.  That was exactly, word for word, how a foreigner acquaintance of mine who was on a whirlwind tour of the Caraga region called Lianga when he passed by my town recently.  I stared at the e-mail on the computer screen and had almost made up my mind to reply with a blistering defense of my hometown when I decided to hold off for a moment and reflect for a moment if this visitor's description had any merit at all.

I have always considered Lianga to be quaintly beautiful in its own way, if not exactly picturesque (although many locals will certainly disagree with me on this point).  Like many truly old, coastal towns all over the country, its real charms are not patently or immediately obvious.  Its old houses and narrow streets do not come out well in most photographs.  "Just like another tired, third world, ramshackle town," wrote a reader of this blog from Europe not long ago after looking over some of my pictures of this town.

Lianga has to be experienced in order to be fully appreciated.  One has to walk its streets and alleyways, amble through its marketplace and public places, seek refuge in the blessed coolness of its lovely, old church, loiter in the rickety yet historied corridors of its schools or walk barefoot on its lovely beaches before the real magic sets in.  It is definitely not one of those touristy show towns where one glance is enough to convince a visitor to kick off his shoes, rush into sandals and shorts then start running for the nearest hotel resort.

Stormy Endings

December has always been traditionally considered a month for wet and stormy weather by the local people here in Lianga.  But as as 2011 drew to a close barely two weeks ago, we here had to admit that we did not expect the last month to be more stormy, in more ways than one, than we had bargained for.

First, Typhoon Sendong (international name Washii) caught us by surprise when it made landfall late afternoon on Dec. 16 near Hinatuan town on Surigao del Sur's southern tip. Hinatuan is just over an hour's drive from Lianga and the typhoon, packing winds of at least 60 kph near its center, struck our area hard just as dusk was gathering.  Power lines snapped and electric posts toppled over plunging much of the whole province into darkness.

Many coastal houses especially those built with light materials sustained damage and at least one motorized boat was reported missing at sea.  Last minute voluntary evacuation, however, by many local people living in coastal areas vulnerable to storm surges and heavy seas did prevent the great toll in human lives and massive damage to properties that the cities of Cagayan de Oro and Iligan would suffer later in that night.

Most Lianga residents were spared the worst of the gale force winds and flooding that ravaged many areas in Mindanao along the typhoon's track that veered north and west of Surigao del Sur.  For most of the local folks, the storm only inflicted the inconvenience of going through almost a day and a half without electricity, clean water and mobile telecommunications as all mobile cellphone service were cut off almost immediately during the initial onslaught of the storm.

Left Behind

Only in recent years has it become obviously and painfully clear to many of the people here in Lianga that that if there was one industry that could help the town lift itself out of years of economic apathy and stagnation, it would have to be foreign and domestic tourism. I remember just a few years ago one foreigner friend gazing in wonder at the thundering surf at one of the local beaches, his bare feet half buried in the white sand. "My God!" he exclaimed. "You live in a tropical paradise yet you don't make money out of it.  How can you all be so blind?" He then shook his head in exasperation and disbelief.

For decades now, town leaders here have looked towards some form of industrialization as Lianga's ticket to economic progress.  Memories of the heyday of the logging industry in the 1960's when the Lianga Bay Logging Company was the engine powering the town's then rapid growth and economic expansion remained obstinately fixed in their collective minds.  There were grandiose plans to reactivate the logging franchise which had folded up in the 1970's.  The plans included proposals for a seaport (two were built but both remained unused to this very day) which would hopefully turn Lianga into a shipping and marketing hub for this part of Mindanao.

None of these proposals in the wake of present day economic realities, despite all the rhetoric, effort and money wasted on them, amounted to anything significant and it was only recently when the obvious became, well, glaringly apparent.  Build on the town's strengths.  Capitalize on what it already has.  And what it had, by the grace of Mother Nature, were plenty of was white sand beaches and spectacular seascapes that local and foreign tourists could not get enough of.

Vantage Point: Bretania Islands

If anyone wants an example of how the slow yet promising growth in local and foreign tourism is helping transform the landscape in the Lianga area, one can be found right beside the national highway some 16 or so kilometers north of Lianga and just before entering Barangay Gata of San Agustin town.  There on the side of a hill, the Department of Public Works and Highways has recently built a rest stop for motorists that offers, as a bonus, a view deck that allows visitors to enjoy a spectacular view of the Bretania Islands and the mangrove forests that line much of the coastal areas in this part of eastern Mindanao.

The islands, of course, have become in recent years a huge attraction for visitors drawn to its white sand beaches and pristine, blue waters.  The Barangay Gata rest stop just happens to be located right by a portion of the national highway that snakes up a hill and curves around a natural cliff the overlooks the islands.The small, compact building near the entrance with toilet facilities for both sexes would obviously be a welcome first destination for the weary traveler but this particular pit stop has an even better and more welcome attraction for tourists and visitors.

Before the rest stop was constructed, motorists zipping along could usually catch, through tangled grass and thick shrubs, tantalizing glimpses of the island group floating like priceless jade pieces on the blue-gray waters below them.  Nowadays they can gaze upon and relish the scenery without any obstruction hampering their view while parked on the view deck and safe from the constant road traffic or (better yet) by getting out to stretch their legs and standing just behind a protective yet decorative wooden barrier.

Mining In Caraga

Last Monday, New People's Army rebels made simultaneous raids on the compounds and facilities of three large mining firms located in Claver, Surigao del Norte. The targeted mining companies, Taganito Mining Corporation (TMC), Taganito HPAL Corporation and Platinum Group Metals Corporation (PGMC), are among the country's largest nickel ore exporters to Japan, China and Australia.

Before retreating, the rebels held some mining employees as hostages (released later in the same day) then burned down valuable mining equipment, dozens of dump trucks and even warehouse and office facilities.  They also carted away a sizable cache of firearms and radio equipment belonging to the three companies and their security forces.

Jorge Madlos also known as Ka Oris, spokesman for the National Democratic Front in Mindanao, has justified the twin attacks as part of the revolutionary movement's goal to penalize "environmentally exploitative and destructive large-scale mining companies in the Caraga region".  The Caraga region, which comprises the provinces of Surigao del Norte, Surigao del Sur, Agusan del Norte and Agusan del Sur, has been seeing in the past few years a dramatic increase in the number of investments in both large-scale and small scale mining activities.

The government in Manila, on the other hand, as well as the military and police forces, have condemned the rebel raids as merely a form of economic sabotage and a ploy by the rebels to extort money from vulnerable mining firms under the guise of "revolutionary taxes".  There is talk of investigating "security and intelligence lapses" that led to the local military and police forces being caught unaware by the attacks and promises of "improving future security" for mining firms operating in the affected area.  Blah blah blah. And so on and so forth.  We have all heard it before.