Author Topic: 78 yrs old farmer ‘saved’ by coconut tree  (Read 768 times)

MikeLigalig.com

  • FOUNDER
  • Webmaster
  • *****
  • Posts: 33285
  • Please use the share icons below
    • View Profile
    • Book Your Tickets on a Budget
78 yrs old farmer ‘saved’ by coconut tree
« on: February 17, 2016, 06:59:03 PM »
78 yrs old farmer ‘saved’ by coconut tree
By Ven rebo Arigo

He has lived by picking coconut fruits as one source of income, but only when tropical storm Seniang flooded his place to a record-breaking height that a 78 year old farmer did value coconut as a real ‘tree of life’.

Bonifacio Verano of Loreto, Cortes recounted to Gov. Edgar Chatto in one of the province’s disaster response HEAT caravans last week his “Houdini” escape from imminent death, clinging to a coconut tree, at the height of the December 30 howler Seniang.

In an emotion-filled gratitude to the life-saving tree, he vowed that if he finds money, he will buy the coconut tree, (not to sell as coco lumber) but to let it stand there “until I die, until nature decides the tree to die.”

It could not be confirmed, however, if Gov. Chatto gave the money needed by Verano to purchase his life saving coconut tree.

THE ORDEAL
Typhoon Seniang killed 7 people, left almost a billion-worth of damages in agriculture, properties and infrastructures, among others, across the province and the figure is still counting.

It was past midnight of December 29 or early dawn of the 30th and the storm made its landfall in Bohol and its peaked winds brought heavy rains resulting flashfloods, washing out Verano’s wooden house on the upper side of the hanging wooden bridge that connects Loreto, Cortes and Tupas, Antequera across the Abatan river.

The river overflowed to an unprecedented level which, according to Loreto captain Zosimo Jumamil, Jr., they had never witnessed and experienced before and during any strong typhoons in the past.

Verano and his 32-year-old unmarried daughter Rosa were flushed out by the raging floodwater that at the same time uprooted and washed out their house.

He could remember his daughter jumping out of the window into the rising, roaring floodwater and from then he no longer heard of her for hours.

As the storm’s wrath heightened amidst the blinding darkness of the disastrous pre-New Year’s night, Verano was fighting for his life floating until he got hold of a drifting banana trunk.

He was flushed farther while clinging to the banana trunk until he sensed himself surrounded by standing coconut trees.

Quickly with all his might, he grabbed the body of a coconut tree and would climb it for safety but, of all the trees there, including the one he was clinging on, had no hakhak (coconut tree steps).

But lucky for him, because tucked in his waist that time was his sharp farm bolo.

“Akong gitakin ang sundang adtong gabhiona,” Verano said, which he thus used to chop the opposite sides of the tree and make hakhak as fast as he could.

WIIL TO SURVIVE
“Puwerteng paeta, puwerteng intawong looya sa akong kahimtang,” the survivor old man continued narrating, this time tearfully. He wiped his tears with a soiled handkerchief as his listeners, including the governor, intently waited for him to continue narrating his story.

Verano recalled that while hacking the sides of the body of the tree to make hakhak with his right arm holding the bolo, his left arm was also tightly grappling around the trunk while pushed by rampaging flood waters. He was also biting a plastic pack that contained important land documents which were the only things he and his daughter could secure for safety in their frantic rush for life as flood waters hit their house.

Verano also lost his domesticated turtle. The old man, however, was sure that his pet had surely survived, swimming to delight elsewhere and may one day find his way back to him.

Continuing to cling for life, whenever the rising flood water reached his feet, he would create another hakhak, for him to climb upward, temporarily escaping from sure death as the heavy rains transformed the land into a virtual ocean.

The last notch, uppermost coconut tree step he had hacked, suggested that the water level from the ground reached as high as 20 feet.

Extremely exhausted, wet and trembling to the biting cold that frozen his flesh, Verano held himself tight up the tree for about 10 long hours from past midnight to 10 in the morning.

The tree was swaying as the storm wind blows and sometimes the old man felt he was reaching the limits of human endurance. The hunger further weakened him down but his will to survive simply did not surrender.

Governor Chatto quipped while listening to the 78 year old man survival story: “ang akong dughan murag pod ug lubi nga gihakhakan.”

DIVINE VOICES
Fate was indeed kind to the father and his daughter as both were destined to see each other again. They were brought to each other’s arms when they heard voices, shouting, calling each other.

“Ros! Ros! Ros! Buhi pa ba intawon ka Inday?” Verano recalled as his shouted from up the tree to his daughter somewhere.

The governor and others listening his tale where reminded of the scene in the film “Titanic” wherein dying Jack faintly calls his Rose in the middle of the freezing waters as the unsinkable ship slowly goes down to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.

Rosa immediately sought help for a possible rescue of her father after hearing his loud call. She was on the other hilly side of the overflowing river and managed to save herself on higher grounds.

Barrio officials and neighbors on boats finally rescued Verano and his daughter.

Rosa, out of five children, is the only one living with his old father. Verano’s wife died last June. Two of his children have also been dead while the remaining two have long settled with their respective families in Loon and Antequera.

EARTHQUAKE SURVIVOR
The Veranos earlier resided in Tupas, Antequera but their house was damaged during the magnitude 7.2 October 15, 2013 earthquake. (Tupas was affected, too, by storm Seniang.)

According to Tupas barangay captain Edwin Pilongo Cuenca, the Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) had advised the family to permanently leave their dwelling and relocate to a safer place. Verano, his wife (who was alive then) and Rosa decided to transfer to Loreto, Cortes where they have a small land.

Apart from coconut picking and other farm works, Verano also used to gather sand along the Abatan River in addition to his meager income.

Verano rushed to Tupas where Chatto met him in a chance encounter as soon as the Seniang survivor learned of the province’s disaster extended response - mini-HEAT caravan there on Tuesday.

The governor also attended to the emergency needs of the storm victims in simultaneous caravans in Loreto, Cortes itself and Busao, Maribojoc, where storm flood likewise hit record level.

MARK OF ‘VERANO’
Nong Pasyo, as he is fondly called by his neighbors, told the governor that he carved on the lower trunk of the coconut tree, (after he regained strength) the letter “V” (initial of his family name)”. Like the legendary Mexican hero ‘Zorro”, he also wants to leave a mark that will let everyone remember that this coconut tree gave him a new lease in life.

He said, it will also serve as a marker that up on that tree, a 78-year-old man fought nature’s wrath and lived to tell his tale.

Linkback: https://tubagbohol.mikeligalig.com/index.php?topic=81871.0
John 3:16-18 ESV
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son (Jesus Christ), that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.

👉 GET easy and FAST online loan at www.tala.com Philippines

Book tickets anywhere for planes, trains, boats, bus at www.12go.co

unionbank online loan application low interest, credit card, easy and fast approval

balong

  • LUMINARY
  • ***
  • Posts: 6617
    • View Profile
    • Connect
Re: 78 yrs old farmer ‘saved’ by coconut tree
« Reply #1 on: February 17, 2016, 11:38:40 PM »
koyawa pod ning estoryaha oi. 78 yrs.old maka survive pa. di ko kamao mo saka ug lubi, pero grabe ko mo drive .
 ma kuyawan ahong asawa. kanang mo speeding na gani ko, mo ingon dajon ahong asawa, dispasyo, dispasyo.
aho pong tubagon, oi, buhi pa diay si nong pasyo

boss mike, kong wa pa mapalit ni pasyo ang lubi, im willing to donate the money, seriously.
para dili ma potol ang lubi ug himoong coco lumber aron naay buhing handumanan si nong pasyo

Linkback: https://tubagbohol.mikeligalig.com/index.php?topic=81871.0
BOOK YOUR TICKETS anywhere for planes, trains, boats, bus at www.12go.co

balong

  • LUMINARY
  • ***
  • Posts: 6617
    • View Profile
    • Connect
Re: 78 yrs old farmer ‘saved’ by coconut tree
« Reply #2 on: February 19, 2016, 03:24:42 AM »
pakapinan nato ug plaque nga

tree of life donated to nong pasyo from bolanon.com

Linkback: https://tubagbohol.mikeligalig.com/index.php?topic=81871.0
BOOK YOUR TICKETS anywhere for planes, trains, boats, bus at www.12go.co

unionbank online loan application low interest, credit card, easy and fast approval

Tags: