Home » My Family » Typhoon Yolanda Vs. the Poizner / Abad Family

Typhoon Yolanda Vs. the Poizner / Abad Family

Typhoon Yolanda struck the Philippines and once again I was reminded just how special my wife really is. You know meeting Leonor was truly the best thing that ever happened to me and as much as I already was aware of it at the time, I find I am learning more with each passing day what an extraordinary woman i have managed to capture and make my own. To this day I have no idea how I got so lucky.

typhoon yolanda relief goods on the truck image

Typhoon Yolanda relief goods on the truck for the first of many deliveries

The Typhoon Yolanda hit and my wife was with me in Canada for a visit. She burst into action. She made posters and started calling all her new found friends and family. She was relentless and in the end managed to raise over $2000 that she then used to purchase supplies for the outlying areas that got devastated by the storm and were very slow to receive government aid.

She and her sisters and brothers and their families worked really hard to get it all together. It started off with going into the city of Cebu and purchasing all the goods. They bought 50 kilo sacks of rice, canned goods, and a bunch of supplies. They had to make many trips because my wife’s small Honda Fit could not hold all the stuff. It took 2 weeks just to buy all the supplies.

Then it had to be broken down into smaller packages that could be given away to individual families. The rice had to be weighed and bagged and individual packets had to be assembled for distribution.  I had no idea this would be such a monumental task and Leonor and her sisters and nieces and our daughter went at it like demons. Even with all this effort it still took 3 weeks to pack it all up and get it ready for shipping. It never occurred to me just how big a job this really was. We did this on a small scale I can now understand why the governments and foreign countries had to work so hard to do it on such a massive scale.

Well once the goods were all packaged they were loaded back into sacks for transport to the areas where they were to be distributed. My wife and her sister decided to focus on the area of Naval and Biliran which is the home town of the Abad clan. It is located about two hours or so from Tacloban city. This was the city that Typhoon Yolanda virtually wiped off the map. All of the foreign government aid was focused on helping the people from Tacloban city so it made sense to help the outlying areas.

Giving out the relief packages

Giving out the relief packages

Well a big truck had to be commissioned to take the goods to the ship terminal so they could be transported by boat to the other island. Another truck had to be commissioned to pick the stuff up on the other side and deliver it to my sister in laws house. It was this house that would become the distribution center to get the goods to the people. They completely filled the living room of the home.

The children photo

The children of Naval

Well it took another two weeks to deliver all of these packages and get them into the hands of the people that so badly needed them. I accompanied them for the first day but I had to work so my wife, her sister, brother in law, nieces and our daughter had to do the rest. It got done though.

Typhoon Yolanda thank you

Typhoon Yolanda victims say thank you

There is nothing better then the good feeling you get inside knowing that you are able to help!