CEBU CITY, Philippines— Cebu is a mess.
This is how Cebuano engineer, entrepreneur and celebrity Slater Young described his hometown hours after super typhoon Odette’s onslaught.
In his Instagram account he showed photos and videos of the devastation done by Odette in the city.
Aside from the minor damage they have at home, Slater’s heart breaks as he discovers his business headquarters severely damaged by the strong winds of Odette, last Thursday night, December 16.
“We are safe. Cebu’s a mess. No power. No net. Just got signal. People are lining up for water, food, and gas. We have family members that lost their homes. Liteblock got looted. A lot of our employees are now homeless – using our factory as a temporary shelter for them. We’re trying to help out where we can. Praying for everyone,” read his caption.
Today, Slater and his wife Kryz Uy uploaded a video of what seemed to be an encouragement for others to make noise and ask help.
“So we are making this video because we feel like kulang pa yung…. I don’t think Cebu is getting heard, or like the rest of the victims of typhoon Odette. It is because you don’t see a lot of pictures on how bad it is here. Just to get internet we are in our friends’s home there’s just a few places in Cebu where you can actually find internet, especially to upload photos and videos it is very hard to call people, I can’t call our family members very, very hard, a lot of people are asking us for help, again very hard to coordinate with people to just give them help. Kami we are thankful that we’re safe but a lot of the people out there when you are driving it takes like four hours to get gas, it takes like three, four hours to get drinking water…” he then shares some of their friends’ experience during the typhoon that even having a good home and house is still not enough to get through this catastrophe.
He captioned his video post by saying some of the people don’t get the gravity of the situation in Cebu and it pushed him to make this video. “Mag ingay tayo guys, spread the word,” he said.
https://www.facebook.com/cdndigital/videos/453909166256923/
https://www.facebook.com/cdndigital/posts/10160165701844589
Over on his Instagram post he also posted his willingness to share some of the construction equipment his company uses to help in clearing out the streets of Cebu.
Today, he also shares on his IG stories the packed relief goods his team has prepared to help some people get through this horrific typhoon experience.
We are one with Slater in asking for help for all our Sugboanons.
Cebu needs help. / dbs
