Xangsane

Well, we have survived our second typhoon. Last Thursday, the strongest typhoon in 11 years passed over us. It entered our island of Luzon as a catagory 4 typhoon. I am not sure what strength it was when it finally got to our location since we were out of communication by that time. It was actually a little surreal. After days of rain last week, we woke up Thursday morning to a cold breeze blowing through our windows and temps around 73. It was actually really nice. At 9 am the power was shut off as the rains began and by 10:30 we were in the midst of heavy rains and high winds. It's kind of funny that in the US we would have evacuated, but here, being an island, there is not really any place to evacuate. So we sat as a family on our screen porch and watched the weather rage. Since the storm was coming from the front of our house, we were safe sitting in the back. Thankfully the storm moved through quickly and after about 4 hours it was all over. Since we had no power or lines of communication, we kept thinking we must be in the eye, but by nightfall we realized things were over. We were without power and water from Thursday until Saturday, but if you read our blog this summer, you will remember that we have dealt with this before. Allan did manage to get our generator running for a few hours and that held the stuff in the refridgerator. As for personal damage, we had some minor flooding in our kitchen. With the gusting winds, all the seals around our kitchen windows and doors leaked, but since we have marble floors and cement walls there was no damage inside. The trees in the yard and across the ravine are somewhat stripped, but no real damage to the 2 houses or the clinic. Unfortunately, this was not the case in other places. Over 100 people are currently reported as having died, most from flooding and landslides. This number will probably continue to rise in coming days. Also many areas are still with out power or water. Our neighbor has taken some pictures of the damage around our area and I hope to post them here in the next few days.
The kids have enjoyed their time off from school. They had just gone to bed Wednesday night when we got the word that school was canceled for Thursday. I guess it was kind of like having a snow day. They asked if they could please get up and stay up late. Emily had wanted to stay up and watch her first Nascar race. She has been interested in racing since watching "Herbie, Fully Loaded" and "Cars". She stayed up until 11 watching a replay of the race in Delaware, cheering on the Nelsen's cousin who is a Nascar driver. It was very exciting as he was in the lead most of the race, but lost in the last lap when he ran out of gas. The rest of their 4 day holiday was spent playing board games and outside games like Capture the Flag with the 3 kids next door. When power was finally restored, I had to do a couple loads of wet, stinky, muddy clothes from all their days of hard play. They headed off to school this morning. Power had yet to be restored, but the school has generators to provide a limited amount of lights for the day. I am not sure the kids were ready to return to school this morning. I think they would have liked a few more days to goof off. They will get them though beginning Thursday when they start October break. School closes down in Oct. and April for a week and a half to allow boarders to return home and visit their families.