The day when Yolanda made world headlines as the year’s super typhoon, Jade Paredes of Botongan, Estancia, a Pantawid Pamilya beneficiary, together with her husband and her six children was stuck inside their house near the seaside.

They were just eating breakfast when the small carinderia beside their house that she just established this year to provide additional income for her family was damaged by the strong gust of wind and waves.

“Umiiyak na ang mga bata. Nakita ko ang karenderya namin wala ng bubong at dingding. ‘Yung isang anak ko buntis pa natakot ako baka makunan”, she narrated.

Without a second thought, the mother of six followed her instinct and slowly walked towards the hospital near them while hugging and holding each other so that no one will be left behind.

A Set 5 beneficiary of the DSWD’s Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program, Aling Jade and her family are currently staying here in the “tent city” of Estancia, Iloilo after an oil spill in the seaside where they used to live.

“Hindi ko na po matandaan kung kailan kami lumipat dito. Pero matapos ang bagyo binigyan po kami ng 3 kilos of rice, 2 sardines ni Manang Violy, isang Municipal Social Welfare and Development staff”, she said.

“Nagpapasalamat kami kasi sabi ko nga po wala kaming income. Masaya din kasi sabi ko malayo pa ang mararating ang isang gating na iyon”, she added.

Aside from her Pantawid Pamilya status as a grantee of the Program, she is also a Civil Society Organization volunteer of NACPHIL who teaches beneficiaries during Family Development Sessions of her fellow beneficiaries. Aling Jade always teaches other beneficiaries to always be grateful with what they receive from the Program and to strengthen their faith.

Now coping with the Yolanda’s damages to her family and her own community, her faith has provided her strength to look forward to a brighter future after this tragedy.

She is also thankful that the grants her household will receive from Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino will help them get back to a normal life where her children goes back to school again with baon and regular health mmonitoring.

“Una, nagpapasalamat pa din ako although hindi ko masabi na perfect ang service ng programa, nakikita namin ang effort nila kung paano ang ginagawa nila para mapabuti ang aming kalagayan”, she said.

Aling Jade and the people of Estancia remain resilient despite Yolanda’s strong damage to this small town. The ninety-three people who died from the super typhoon will not also be forgotten and will remain in the hearts of the residents of the “Alaska of the Philippines.”/dswd/Jomel Anthony V. Gutierrez