Angkoy said she was very afraid at that time, watching abandoned cars in the street sinking beneath the flood waters. She could not help but wonder if they would go through the same fate. But she had to be strong for her two children who were sick at that time.
When the flood subsided, Filipino groups such as the Guardians Brotherhood and the Migrante chapter in Jeddah went to visit them under the bridge. These fellow OFWs, Manongdo said, had to walk for hours to reach them and hand them food and medicines because some of the roads leading to Khandara bridge were not passable to vehicles then.
No consulate officials came to visit them. Instead, the OFWs themselves went to the Philippine consulate and asked for assistance. They feared then that the deadline for undocumented Filipino workers to leave Saudi Arabia drew nearer.
In front of some of the OFWs who came with Manongdo, Jungco insisted that the OFWs pay 600 riyals for the application form for their travel documents. “But this is piggery!” Manongdo remembered replying in jest. When asked what he meant by “piggery,” he replied that the consulate was treating them like pigs.
Manongdo said Philippine consulate officials knew that they did not have any money since most of them were jobless. He added that when he first asked for the consulate’s help back in 2006, he noticed that “beautiful, stewardess-like” Filipino women were given application forms for travel papers abroad for free.
They demanded to get the application form for the travel papers for free. On January 18, Manongdo, along with his fellow undocumented OFWs, signed their application form. They were advised, however, by the consulate officials to return to Khandara bridge and wait for the Saudi police to arrest them.
Awaiting Deportation
One of Angkoy’s painful memories during her experience in Jeddah as an undocumented worker was when they were finally arrested. She and her husband, with their two children in tow, walked toward the deportation center for more than three hours under the scorching heat of the sun.
“I will never forget that. My two children kept on crying,” Angkoy said. “Every time I remember that day, I wonder how I was able to pull myself together.”
They stayed in the deportation center for five days. “I was relieved when the Saudi police finally arrested us under the Khandara bridge. My hopes were high that I was finally going to go home,” Lubaira Guiandal, 43, told Bulatlat.com, “But I was immediately demoralized upon seeing the deportation center, especially the prison cells where we would have to stay while waiting for our tickets.
Each prison cell, she said, was numbered accordingly from 1 to 16. Migrant workers were moved from one prison cell to another. As one got nearer to cell number 16, he or she was getting closer to going home. The five days, however, was like hell to OFWs from Khandara bridge.
Guiandal said they could barely eat the food that was given to them. But they had to endure and share it equally among themselves. “I never lost hope. I had to be strong because I knew that we would be sent home soon.”
Angkoy was worried for her two children who were not used to eating Arabian food, which was being served to them. For five days, she said, they had nothing but milk, which she bought before they were arrested. She shared this with other OFW mothers who were with her in the prison cell.
Of the 329, about 67 were repatriated on February 8 and 9. But Migrante International said there were about 420 undocumented workers who were repatriated in February alone. Manongdo, who knows almost everyone who used to live under the bridge, said he was surprised to see new faces on their flight home. He later on learned that they were the OFWs who paid for their travel documents, some paid as much as 1,000 to 1,500 riyals.
Flight Back Home
Angkoy felt sad not just for her husband who was left behind but also for Sarah Kakim, her husband’s cousin, who could not leave with them because one of her six children had problems with travel papers. She said Kakim is among the OFWs who lived under Khandara bridge for the longest time, her eldest son, who would turn 12 years old this year, was raised under Khandara bridge.
“She stayed there the longest and she was the one who was left behind,” she said sadly.
Manongdo, for his part, could not hide his sadness when he started narrating the death of his 60-year-old fellow OFW Francisco Cogen. On their flight back to Manila on February 9, Cogen asked Manongdo how long it would still take them to reach the Philippines. “I told him that we were almost there,” he said, adding that the pilot had just announced at that time that they were only 32 minutes away from the Manila airport.
However, about 10 minutes before they landed, Manondo saw Cogen with his head down. He was experiencing an asthma attack. Flight attendants rushed to him and gave him an oxygen mask. When they finally landed, Manongdo wanted to go with Cogen but he and other OFWs were told to quickly line up at the express lane as OWWA officials were waiting for them.
Manongdo later on learned that Cogen died. “He survived everything that we went through up to this,” he said.
Still No Assistance
“When we arrived in OWWA, most of us were sick, especially the children,” Guiandal said. While they were given food, not a single paracetamol was given to those who were sick. Worse, they were informed that they would have to pay for their own fare back to their respective provinces. The OFWs, however, have no money to pay for it.
“I am very sad,” Guiandal said. “When we were still (in Saudi) the government did not help us. Now that we are home, they still could not extend any assistance to us.”
Manongdo, Angkoy, Guiandal, and the rest of the OFWs who were repatriated with them would be knocking from one government office to another, asking for help. “We are not asking for anything big. We just want to go home (to our provinces),” Guiandal said. They would also be lobbying for the immediate repatriation of the other undocumented Filipino workers they left behind.
Gina Esguerra, secretary general of Migrante International, said the government should “immediately and without delay facilitate the repatriation of OFWs, especially the women and children,” adding that the least the Philippine consulate can do is to provide temporary shelter for and the other basic needs of the stranded OFWs. With an average temperature of 16 to 20 degrees, she said, their shabby tents under the bridge could not protect the OFWs from the cold.
“This has become a humanitarian issue especially since children are involved,” Esguerra said, “The government should not wait for anyone to be sick or any bad incidents to happen to our fellow OFWs due to flood, hunger and cold weather.” 
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