This is just a short update, as we know that you are all waiting to hear from us.

Bert and 3 other brothers are this week at the Island of Bohol. That is where the 7.2 earthquake was 2 weeks ago. They have had meetings with all the brothers and met with the families of the 3 brothers who have died in the quake. 

There are 8 Kingdom hall destroyed and another 7 will need repairs. Also there are about 200 homes that need to be repaired or even rebuild. The homes there are made mostly out of a hollow block layer with coconut lumber on top, so that can not withstand a quake of this size. They could not rent a place to set up shop, so now we are using the parking area of the Kingdom hall. We can use the brothers of the Kingdom Hall Construction teams to help out. From the last storm ‘Pablo” we have a nice system to rebuild homes fast. Some of our local brothers are able to do the work themselves and they will be helped with construction materials. 

That was till last friday…

Then the super typhoon hit. For the island of Bohol it did bring a lot of rain and it did storm, but not as strong as they expected. It added a few homes to the list of repairs but not to much.

Now the rest of the country, that is another story. You might have seen on TV that it looks like a true war zone. Communication is very difficult as power lines and cell sites are down. The circuit overseers are visiting the brothers and local elders are caring for their sheep.Tomorrow a brother from the Branch Committee will go and visit the Taclooban area to see what needs to be done.

This storm came at our District Convention time. Quite a few of the Bethel speakers are stranded at airports. Others arrived to find the assemblies cancelled and the venues turned into evacuation centers by the government. 

Metro Manila with it almost 19 million people, escaped the storm completely. They have been cleaning out gutters and drainage-ways for days. Some of the low areas had emergency rubber boats for evacuations given to them, as we expected heavy floods there too. We did get a part of the storm, but rain was not enough for flooding. 

I wish I could tell you more, but we have no more information at this moment. 

The Philippines always get a lot of typhoons during the rainy season, but the people never seem to loose their smile. Jehovah will help our brothers as he always has.

This is it for now.

For all my lovely Filipino friends, please sent no balikbayan boxes. We do appreciate you concern, but at this time, due to the large scale renovations that are going on at Bethel, we can not handle relief goods. Most of the needs are focussed on rebuilding and feeding our brothers. That will take a lot of financial support. Therefor such funding can be sent to the Branch and is so desired, earmarked for Disaster Relief Philippines. 

We love you,

Bert and Jeanine.