MEDIUM RARE
Jullie Y. Daza
As an old but singable song puts it, “I’d like to build the world a home and furnish it with love, grow apple trees and honeybees” . . . In the 21st century in the time of the “amihan” of shorter days and longer nights, let’s wish for a world of homes that can withstand the pernicious cycle of typhoons, floods and landslides, enforced evacuations and wet and wild misery all around, all year round.
Government after government, there appears to be no end to the ever-recurring story of the same families living in the same sites struggling to survive the predictable dangers of living in homes that are not a shelter from the storm but an invitation to disrupt lives. Under the Marcos 2 administration, a promise has been made to build six million homes, or one million for each year until 2028. How many of these have been programmed for typhoon-prone areas?
A house is not a home unless it’s built to last, not as a temporary structure left to the mercy of nature and man. A gentleman from Bicol by the name of Gil Bien has designed a “typhoon-proof” house that he calls “cuboid” – I guess from the Tagalog “kubo” for home and “cube” for its shape. According to Mr. Bien, the house features no corners, no sharp turns, no gutters, only rounded angles.
Has Housing Secretary Jose Acuzar taken a look at a model of the house-without-corners? At the rate our generational typhoon victims have been living with storms as veterans of evacuation centers, the invention should at least pique his curiosity.
Last week, Marikina Mayor Marcy Teodoro proudly showed PBBM the site of a massive project that will benefit 10,000 families to be housed in condo-type structures. As Marikina attracts floods and urban planner Jun Palafox has been advocating repeatedly, “all development is vertical,” not only because of the floods issue but the scarcity of land in urban neighborhoods.
Meanwhile, residents of three cities in the Visayas – Iloilo, Bacolod, Roxas – are ready to see their dreams come true next year after groundbreaking ceremonies were held last month as part of the roll-out of the first one million homes. Perhaps, chapter 2 of the program will include Samar, BARMM, Aklan.