Monday, November 11, 2013 – continued:
After the Tacloban Zone Missionaries left to the airport, I took the time to go through the bags that I had carried from Tolosa, narrowing down my belongings to 10 kg of what I thought was most important. Focusing on the things that were irreplaceable, I decided to keep all of the letters that I had received while on my mission, all of my daily planners, my study notes, my journal, my highlighted copy of Jesus the Christ, and a few other small things like all of my nametags. Still having too much weight, I left a stack of photos my family had sent me, knowing that they had electronic copies back home. I tore the cover from my Preach My Gospel, where I had been keeping a diagram that showed an overview history of my mission so far.
About an hour after Tacloban Zone had left for the airport, we heard the sound of many voices coming from the front door. They had never made it to the airport. The traffic was so bad that even after trying two different routes to get to the airport, they had barely been able to cover any ground at all. Realizing that they weren’t going to be able to make it to the airport in time to get on their flight, they had turned around and come back to the mission home. We were all going to try to get out tomorrow. I know that I have to work on my charity, because even though I’m sure they were even more disappointed than we had been to find that they wouldn’t be able to leave until the next day, I was still somewhat glad that we would have company for what should be our last night in Tacloban City.
After a small dinner, since it was Monday night, we decided that we would have a Family Home Evening type activity. Organized on the spot, we had a very good program complete with several musical numbers, a spiritual thought, a lesson, and some fun games. The activity turned out to be very helpful in lifting our spirits for our last night.
At the end of the activity, President Andaya, who had just shown up after talking with the Area Presidency, told us about the new plan for our evacuation. We were told that we would all be leaving together the following morning and that they would try to get as many of us onto the first airplane as possible. Anyone left over would be put on the next flight. At the Area Offices in Manila, they had electronically purchased tickets for almost all of the seats on a Philippine Airlines flight.
As the night progressed, another group of missionaries arrived that had been evacuated from Tolosa Zone. They had stayed in their areas until they were picked up earlier that day.
Trying to find something to do, I saw that Sister Andaya was going to be treating the wounds of two of the missionaries that had been injured during the storm. The rain from the typhoon had been so heavy at their rented home that the ceiling had started to bow under the weight of the water piling up on top of it. Fearing that the roof might collapse if they didn’t let the water out, the first had grabbed a machete and started to punch holes in the ceiling, but his hand slipped off the grip and onto the blade and he cut his fingers badly. The second had picked up the machete to continue the work of the first, and then fell victim to the same mishap.
The wounds had already been treated by Sister Andaya the night before, but it was time to dress the wound again. I volunteered to use my very bright flashlight to aid in the operation, which was painful even for me to watch. The cut was so deep that tendons had been severed, and they were unable to bend some of their fingers. What was most painful, though, was to watch Sister Andaya, force the cotton swabs deep into the wound to make sure that it was cleansed thoroughly.
While Sister Andaya worked on dressing their wounds, I worked on sorting the mission first-aid kit. Since missionaries had been arriving at the mission home, many of them had donated their first-aid kits to the mission, and since then, the mission kit had devolved into a giant pile of band-aids along with a few more-useful things. I sorted the supplies that had been collected, noting that we had enough band-aids to hold together Dr. Frankenstein’s creature, but barely any sterile gauze, which is what we needed the most.
By then, it was getting late and most of us had gone to bed. This time, since we were going to be leaving early in the morning, we were all just going to spend the night at the mission home. The sisters went upstairs, and the elders stayed downstairs. I lined up four plastic chairs in a row in the middle of the room, laid out the fitted sheet I had brought with me. I slept remarkably well considering the sleeping arrangement.