The typhoon came thru here Sunday night: as a signal five,  but it weakened when it entered central Luzon so maybe it was only a signal four when it hit us.

My room is the one best protected (window faces the center of the compound, and the other window has a nearby wall) so we all were in my bedroom hunkered down: including five dogs...

the typhoon, which came up suddently and got strong quickly, changed again: from signal 5 to signal 4, and started traveling faster than predicted: It was supposed to be at the peak at midnight, but the eye passed over us at 10 pm, and the winds had pretty well stopped by 4 am.

The bad news is that it caused major damage. Long report from the Inquirer here.

 there was a landslide nearby that buried and killed some people.

And many local people lost their Roof, including our maid and the house owned by Joy's pastor. Alas, in shoddy houses, if the roof goes, the entire house goes, and of course many of the houses were flooded.

Sigh.

No electricity, and maybe none for another week. City water seems to be on, but our internet was off because no electricity for the office modem, and Joy's internet is completely out.

Our generator needed fixing, so for two days we used my backup generator, which is too small for the office but keeps us in fans and will run the refrigerator and even my airconditioner weakly if we don't add any other appliances. But now our large generator is fixed, so that is a help.

The neighbors are here getting their cellphone charged. People need cellphones to keep in touch with family etc.

I went out for the first time today. The center square plaza lost their large lovely tree, which fell across some of the food kiosk, but the ferris wheel looks intact.

our roof was damaged, and all of our banana trees were destroyed, and the fruit trees in our garden lost limbs.

But the bad news is that the winds flattened the almost Rice rice crop, and even our rice storage bodega lost it's roof.

since the business lady that Kuya sold our last crop to has not paid him yet, we are already short money, and now might face a major loss in the summer crop. Not just us, of course, but all the rice and vegetable farmers in the area.

Sigh.

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update: Our rice delivery couldn't get to Manila yesterday due to debris/trees blocking roads but went today.

Lots of locals have vlog with local update