The Principal

San Jose Central School in Tacloban is still a debris field, and since it has been pouring here since days, now large parts of the compound are flooded. The rain and the wind, which lets the scantily repaired roofs creak and the tarpaulins flutter, reminds children and teachers of the terrifying day that destroyed their school and their city. 75 children of San Jose School did not survive the typhoon – and that is only the number of officially confirmed and identified victims.  There are also teachers who lost children. But as in every school that I visit here, the dedication and enthusiasm of the teachers just makes me speechless. That is why today I just let the Principal of San Jose School talk. The following parts of our conversation impressed me the most.

“We have one teacher who until today is missing her only daughter. ‘Maybe she got washed ashore on a remote island and a local family there adopted her’, she sometimes says. She just cannot close for herself that her daughter died, as she never saw her again.”

“Our school had been selected for a ‘Computers in School’ programme, and we had just received fabulous new equipment. But then the storm surge came and washed away everything in our school up to two meters height. Now everything is gone or broken. Just there in the front, I had a little garden. It was one of the children’s favourite places. Now look at it – all that is left is mud.”

„Our housekeeper always stopped by at my office: ‚Ma’am, anything special to do today?‘. He painted and repaired and took good care of our school. Together with his wife he died in the floods. I miss him.”

“We used to be more than 4,000 children here in San Jose School. When we had ‘Back to School’ last week, about 1,200 showed up. Most of them are now living elsewhere with relatives because their house got destroyed. Every day a few more children come back, people slowly start to return and rebuild their lives from scratch. They lost everything.”

“We are so incredibly thankful for all the support we receive, for all the people from all over the world who are here to help us. You left your families at home, during two of the most important celebrations of the year – Christmas and New Year’s – just to help us! We will never forget this.”