* For photo essay, click on https://reut.rs/34wCssP
By Eloisa Lopez
SITIO PARIAHAN, Philippines, Nov 30 (Reuters) - Danica
Martinez, 16, grew up in a house that grows taller every few
years.
Her father raises the stilts of their bamboo hut so water
from the sea doesn't reach the floor. They live in Sitio
Pariahan, a coastal village in the Philippines that was once an
island, and is now without land.
Sitio Pariahan, about 17 km (10.5 miles) north of Manila, is
sinking about 4 cm (1.5 inches) every year, owing largely to
land subsidence from the population's overuse of groundwater,
according to experts.
Now rising sea levels caused by global warming could soon
make this village unliveable, a problem faced by other countries
in Asia, where the poorest communities are hardest hit.
A deep well is the only source of water, and residents use
it to bathe, clean, cook and, sometimes, even to drink.
Solar panels are installed on many rooftops for electricity,
mostly to watch television that's shared between neighbours. On
days that power is low, residents pass the time by gambling.
Martinez remembers that their village wasn't always like
this. She recalls basketball tournaments and grand feasts that
their community once held, so popular that visitors from nearby
towns would flock to watch performances, and celebrate mass at
the church.
The court is now fully submerged, and the church that was
once filled with devotees is stained with moss.
Much of the destruction happened when Typhoon Nesat struck
in 2011, bringing waves Martinez said were as big as houses.
She saw how the huts were pulled into the sea, one by one,
as she and her siblings held onto bamboo poles. Their school was
also destroyed, and left only with walls. More than 50 families
left and never returned.
Now, Martinez and her siblings take a 30-minute boat ride to
school, sometimes with uniforms drenched by big waves.
WATERWORLD
"It seems scary to look at, but you get used to living like
this," she said. "It's difficult, but also fun."
Her parents rely on their boat to make a living.
"Without a boat, you are paralysed," said her mother Mary
Jane Martinez, who sells crabs her husband catches to the town's
market. She said life in the village was getting harder day by
day, but she still preferred it to the city.
"If you work hard here, you will survive. You only have to
jump on the sea to catch food. In land, you can work hard and
still not have enough," she said.
Her husband, Domingo, said leaving was not an option,
because there is nowhere to go. They once tried to rent an
apartment in a nearby town, but moved back shortly after.
"Our livelihood is here," he said. "If we are asked to move
inland, it would be difficult to make a living. What if we
become beggars there?"
Fernando Siringan, a climate change expert, has studied
Sitio Pariahan closely and said some delta areas north of Manila
were changing rapidly because land was subsiding and water
levels rising at the same time.
"What is being projected 50 years from now or 100 years from
now for many parts of the globe is actually happening right now
at even faster rates," he said.
A U.N. climate change summit will be held in Madrid from
Dec. 2-13, and with wildfire in the United States and Australia,
and severe flooding in Europe all being linked to global
warming, public pressure is rising on cost-conscious national
governments to find urgent solutions. Danica sees no long-term future in what has become like a
scene from "Waterworld", a 1995 film starring Kevin Costner in
which post-apocalyptic tribes live on boats and rafts.
"Someday I also want to leave and experience what it's like
to live inland," she said.
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Photo Essay: Rising seas threaten early end for sinking village
in Philippines https://reut.rs/34wCssP
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