MANILA, Philippines?For some, help never came, even as they hung on to dear life while floodwaters?which one survivor said reminded her of the biblical story about the Great Flood and Noah?s Ark?raged around them.

Still, they survived but they seethed with anger.

With the floodwaters in their house reaching up to their shoulders, Marnie Lintag and her husband jumped up on a table and spent hours standing precariously on it while craning their necks toward a high window so they could cry for help.

But that was the least of her worries.

Lintag was hugging her 6-year-old daughter Maru close to her to make sure the child was not soaked in the swirling flood.

?We were cold and hungry. It came to a point where we had to destroy part of the roof so we could hold her up above the water?she had started shivering from the cold,? the Supreme Court employee said in Filipino.

Lintag said she was hoping against hope that rescue would come. Whenever a helicopter flew overhead, she would scream: ?At least take my child!?

But no rescue came.

Rich and poor alike

The life-and-death tableau was only broken at about 4 a.m. Sunday when the floodwaters slowly, mercifully subsided, leaving them at least alive in their devastated home in Barangay Tañong in Marikina City, one of the areas in Metro Manila worst hit by Tropical Storm ?Ondoy.?

?I am angry. Why didn?t they come to save us? We saw the rescue choppers twice and they saw us, but they never came back. I even said they could leave us there but at least they should save my daughter,? she told the Inquirer.

Then she continued: ?I am very frustrated, but I don?t want to dwell on it anymore. My family is safe. That is the important thing. At least nobody died.?

The Lintags were among the countless people dismayed by the government failure to come to their aid at the height of the massive floods that swept Metro Manila and nearby provinces at the weekend.

The floods made no distinction between the rich and the poor. All suffered in the latest natural disaster to hit the country.

Pagasa?s advice

In the wake of Ondoy?s onslaught, the chief of the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (Pagasa) had an advice to the public: They have the responsibility to heed storm warnings.

?Instead of just watching soap operas on TV, they should also watch the news,? Dr. Prisco Nilo said. He said Pagasa had issued flood warnings as early as Thursday and even raised storm signals the following day.

Nilo also said Ondoy?s rains caused flash floods in Metro Manila because the area formed a ?small basin? where water could rise fast in just a short period of rain.

?It doesn?t matter whether the rain is strong,? he said. ?If the basin is large then it would take several hours [for floods to rise].?

As the calamity struck, distress calls and e-mails from thousands of residents in Metro Manila and their worried relatives flooded TV and radio stations overnight.

?It?s really incredible that the Arroyo government had even thought of buying a new presidential jet,? said writer Elmer Gatchalian, who posted the remark on Facebook.

?You (in the government) should have allotted funds for disaster preparedness. It was reported (Saturday) night that there were only two rubber boats being used for rescue operations in Marikina. We could have at least invested in a helicopter that could pick people up from rooftops.?

Another post by Gatchalian referred to the supposedly lavish dinner President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and her party had in New York on their recent US visit.

?The million pesos spent on that grand dinner in New York should have been used to buy rubber boats instead.?

Time for helping

In Barangay Payatas, Quezon City, the parish priest, Fr. Orlando Noriella, complained that the government response was slow.

?This is the moment when we need them (politicians), not during elections,? the priest said. ?But where are they??

Speaking to his parishioners before he ended Sunday?s afternoon Mass, the priest said he and his fellow churchmen saw barangay officials when they went around evacuation centers on Saturday night.

Flood had swept away the houses of many families living near a creek. But except for getting the names of the affected residents, the barangay officials did not offer any help, the priest said.

The priest lamented that while a state of calamity had been declared to facilitate the release of funds, no food and medicines had reached the affected residents.

?Where is the food? Where are the clothes? And the children are getting sick!? Noriella said in Filipino, his voice shaking.

Looters in action

The flood did destroy not only the Lintags? home, which was newly built.

?We also have an Internet shop. The floods also destroyed it. We had 20 computers, and we?re hoping we can still salvage some of them,? she said.

Jennifer Gan, 26, a medical representative and resident of Provident Villages in Marikina City, said she and her 60-year-old father and 55-year-old mother spent the night in their neighbor?s house, which had a third floor.

?Our house was bungalow-type, and it was really submerged in flood,? she said. ?This is all I saved,? she said, showing her laptop computer.

She said she was ?very angry? at the government over what happened to them.

?I am not only angry but very angry,? she said. ?They keep making promises but why is the response so delayed??

Gan said she and her neighbors were rescued only when the storm was nearly over.

Noah and the Flood

For Mavic Metin, 39, Saturday?s great flood made her think of Noah.

Metin told the Inquirer that she?along with her cat Bill?and 10 other people along A. Bonifacio Drive in Tañong, Marikina City got trapped in a small room on the second floor of another neighbor?s house as flood waters submerged their rented homes.

?We had no food. I only saved the things I can save from my house,? Metin said.

Among the things she managed to save was a Bible with a red cover.

The Bible, she said, still had its pages intact and remained readable even if it had been under water for several hours. She said she was keeping the Bible.

Snakes in the flood

?We have nothing left. No clothes, nothing. Looters even took a laptop computer from my house when I returned to retrieve some things,? she lamented, narrating how she found a window in her rented room pried open Sunday morning and the laptop gone.

In the dark room where Metin and her companions found shelter, they prayed for the downpour to stop. ?We had no food but we were still alive and we had shelter,? she tearfully said.

?It reminded me of the Great Flood [in the Bible]. I remembered the story of Noah?s ark. There was devastation everywhere you looked,? she said.

The epic flood was the great equalizer as rich and middle-class residents fled their homes for safety, turning them into ?evacuees.?

Joey Salgado, chief of Makati?s public information office, said his family took only their dogs and a few belongings with them as they left their three-story house in Northview 2 subdivision in Quezon City at 3 p.m. Saturday.

Salgado said a friend offered space in their home, where he and his family spent the night.

The experience was unforgettable for Salgado and his four children as they waded through floodwaters to reach their car.

?My children even saw a cow and snakes. Perhaps the snakes came from the Marikina River...It seemed so surreal,? he said.

Not ready

The Quezon City government failed to provide assistance on the first day after the disaster hit a densely populated barangay because it was not prepared, said social welfare worker Elsa Corteza.

?We did not anticipate this to happen and we were not prepared,? Corteza told the Inquirer at the Diosdado Macapagal Elementary School, an evacuation site for more than 1,000 families.

A resident of Agno Street, where a fire broke out during the height of the flood, expressed his anger at local politicians who, he said, used the disaster to enhance their ambitions.

The resident, who did not give his name, pointed to a tent put up near the fire site manned by people wearing T-shirts bearing the politician?s name. They were distributing cups of porridge to the victims.

?The government boasted of billions of pesos of surplus and yet until now they could not even extend a decent meal and mats for the victims,? he said. With reports from Nikko Dizon, Allison W. Lopez and Nancy C. Carvajal