[Inside the Newsroom] Lisod mapobre, mas lisod mabuhi sa trahedya

Pigado is the Bisaya word for “difficult” or “complicated.”

In Cebu, we use lisod or apeke to describe situations that are hard to manage or impossible to overcome. 

When Rappler education reporter Jelo Mantaring and I visited Sarangani province and General Santos City, pigado was how the survivors of the June 8 magnitude 7.8 earthquake described their situation almost two weeks in the aftermath.

It’s the same word farmers used to describe their inability to access their harvest due to landslides, how the fisherfolk would talk about being restricted from the shorelines for a month, and how families mourned the deaths of children.

Pigado kaayo. Very difficult, indeed.

MOURNING. Every morning, Armando Dantes wakes up to see the empty space of his home, where a wall had collapsed following the June 8, 2026 earthquake, killing his daughter and two grandchildren. John Sitchon/Rappler

Recovery has been slow. Much like what happened to the northern parts of Cebu, especially Bogo City, after the magnitude 6.9 quake on September 30, 2025, businesses closed down, families slept in tents outside their homes, and many roads were either destroyed or blocked due to debris.

What set the Mindanao quake and the Cebu disaster apart is the magnitude of the  damage and destruction. The numbers tell us more about what happened.

The last situation report for the Cebu quake’s aftermath, on October 24, 2025, listed the following: 750,814 affected individuals, 79 deaths, and 559 injured persons. Damage to infrastructure was pegged at P73 million.

In the Mindanao quake’s aftermath, the government tallied a total of 1.67 million affected individuals, 88 deaths, 1,316 injured, and 24 missing persons, based on a June 30, 2026, situation report. Damage to infrastructure was estimated at P1.4 billion.

READ: 

• Rebuilding from scratch: Soccsksargen’s road to recovery in quake’s aftermath
• Many still in General Santos makeshift shelters a week after quake
• Sarangani fisherfolk worry for their livelihood after coastal uplift
• How does coastal uplift affect livelihood in Glan, Sarangani?

It was worse seeing it up close and personal. On June 17, our team went to Sitio Datal Salvan in Barangay San Jose, General Santos City, where we found around 400 residents staying at a makeshift shelter set up on a community drier. 

A community drier is an open-spaced and concrete ground that is typically used for drying crops. These driers can be dangerously hot, especially for senior citizens and children, making it a risky place for shelter.

On June 19, we visited the Adelina T. Recto Elementary School in Barangay Pangyan, Glan, Sarangani, where we met the school principal, Gerlita Wata. 

The principal lamented how the school, which stood as a beacon of hope for the children of farmers and fisherfolk, was now rendered unusable and forever condemned due to earth movement and multiple safety hazards. 

The earthquake didn’t just take away livelihoods. It extinguished the dreams of many families that were supposedly building their lives away from poverty.

The affected towns and cities still have a long way to go before they can get back on their feet but if there’s anything I’ve learned from covering disasters — you’ll never know where help comes from but it’s guaranteed to arrive so long as we tell these stories.

After our fieldwork in Sitio Datal Salvan and the Adelina T. Recto Elementary School, netizens were quick to comment on our posts and ask where they could send help.

We want to keep their stories alive and drive more help to the quake-affected communities. If that’s the kind of journalism you want to support, then subscribe to Rappler+! – Rappler.com

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