Rabbit Hole: How You Can Help The Manila Gig Venue Recover From Typhoon Carina

Following the effects of Typhoon Carina, Manila gig venue Rabbit Hole needs your help.

Last week, Typhoon Carina swept across the Philippines, leaving many different communities and places in need of all kinds of assistance and aid due to its devastating effects. One of those that were heavily affected was Rabbit Hole — a beloved, up-and-coming gig venue and café located in Sampaloc, Manila that recently just celebrated their first year of operations.

What happened exactly

On July 24, the venue revealed on their social media that their space got flooded the night before because of the torrential rain, effectively damaging many of their belongings, including music equipment, furniture, various food supplies, as well as a majority of their vinyl record collection.

A statement from the venue

On July 28, Rabbit Hole posted an official statement on their plans moving forward, as well as expressing their heartfelt thanks to the people who have reached out to them in order offer help and donations as well as propose ideas for fundraising. “Gusto namin ulit magpasalamat sa lahat ng gustong tumulong, mag-donate, mag-fund raising at sa lahat ng ideas n’yo (Once again, we would like to thank all of you who want to help, donate, do a fundraising, and for all your ideas),” the venue stated, also expressing their apologies to the organizers and artists whose events they had to cancel due to the damage resulting from the typhoon.

“Dahil sa inyo, nagkar’on kami ng lakas kahit pa’no. Nakakatulong ‘yung mga sinasabi n’yo. Nababasa namin ‘yan lahat (Because of you, we gained strength despite what happened. The things you’ve said have helped us. We read all of them),” they further said, expressing their astonishment at the amount of support and love they have received from their community. “Nung nangyari ‘to lahat, inisip namin na magsarili muna at kami muna aayos nito, tutal kami lang rin naman nagtayo nito nung simula. Nung sinimulan namin ‘to, gusto lang namin mag-try. Pero dahil sa inyong lahat, gusto namin mag-try ulit (When all of this happened, we thought that we’d isolate ourselves for a while and we’d be the ones to fix everything, since we’re the ones who established this in the beginning. When we started this, we just wanted to try. But because of all of you, we want to try again).”

The bad updates

In the statement, they shared a couple of updates regarding the damages they have incurred, including their vinyl collection, bass and guitar amps, drum set, cassette tape player, couch, two refrigerators, one chest freezer, all of their cables, and three electric fans.

The good updates

On the other hand, Rabbit Hole also shared a number of good updates, including having already finished cleaning the space up. They also shared that a few other things were undamaged while some of their equipment still seems to be working somehow. These include the lights, their turntables, wall-mounted speakers, mixers, air conditioner, cooking equipment, coffee machine, chairs, tables, and a bass guitar on display. Furthermore, they shared that their whole team is safe, aside from their individual homes also being flooded.

Moving forward

Following these, Rabbit Hole stated their future plans. For the time being, they will resume operations as a café with a minimal menu, which includes their drink menu from before as well as pancit canton and pandesal. In addition, they will save up for repairs and replacements for the items they have lost or were damaged during the storm. They will also be selling the undamaged vinyl at a cheaper price in order to help raise more funds.

What you can do to help

Rabbit Hole is open to all kinds of help and ideas that may be able to help them recover.

For donations, or if you have any equipment that you are willing to lend or sell at cheaper prices to Rabbit Hole, you may message the venue’s Facebook or Instagram accounts.

In addition, for monetary donations, the venue would prefer if people visited and bought food from their menu instead of giving them money directly. However, for those who really want to donate money, they are still open to it in order to help Rabbit Hole begin again and sustain their current staff while they are not yet fully operational. Donations can be made via GCash or Maya through this number — 09157897374.

Lastly, once they re-open for live shows again, bar guarantees will be waived for future gigs.

Find the full details on how to help Rabbit Hole here.