Funeral parlors were overwhelmed, forcing survivors to bury their dead near where they were found - on church grounds, roadsides, beaches and in front yards and backyards.
The worst-hit Tacloban and outlying regions have crawled back from the rubble. Shopping malls, hotels and offices have reopened, with cars, taxi cabs and motorcycles clogging downtown streets - the same spots where huge mounds of debris and bodies lay scattered weeks after Haiyan blew away. Yet, human scars are harder to overcome.
The 7-meter (21-foot) -high waves also took away Pedrero's house with all its precious belongings - his family's pictures and personal mementos. Also gone was his fishing boat, his only source of income.
Like him, Bacsal still relies on dole-outs mostly from relatives and friends. Without her husband, tricycle driver Jonathan, and her house, she now lives with her six children in a shack built from storm debris.
Amid continuing adversity, Bacsal's family is being held together by faith - an altar with rosaries and the images of Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary adorn a wall - and a bubbly, new family member, 7-month-old baby John William. His cries filled the bare shack.
"He gives me joy, just by being beside me," Bacsal said, cradling her baby.
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