So last night I had my first enounter with a tropical storm, or a typhoon as they’re called in this part of the world. You may also know them as cyclones, hurricanes, tropical storms or as the Australians call them: Wet Willies or something similar. This one hit Hong Kong and Shenzhen head-on last night at around 1:00 in the morning. It wasn’t a full force storm and it was a little bit on the weak side they tell me.
At about 12:30 I go to bed and wake up a few hours later to the sound of howling wind and torrential rain. Nothing to worry about, right? On the 23rd floor you generally don’t experience floods anyway. This morning I am woken up by Sean who tells me to get out of bed. It was 8:30 so I unwillingly complied. So I throw my legs over the bed and onto the floor and what do I hear?
Splash. ‘Hmm, normally the floor doesn’t go splash’, I think to myself.
So I get out of bed and the whole apartment is just absolutely flooded. About 5-6 centimeters of water just lying there across everything. My room and the other bedroom were a little better off. But you know, in a situation like this it really just takes a few minutes to sink (haha, little play on words there) in.
The odd thing was that I got up at around 3:30 to go to the toilet and nothing was going on. So in the space of about 4 to 5 hours about 150-300 litres of water managed to seep in through the balcony window doors. How on earth is that possible?
Thankfully, damage was limited (though the floor is starting to get a bit lumpy) and the electricity switched off in the night which is really fortunate. Or it could have ended a lot more dramatically (it’s China, you don’t know about such things). And after about 2 hours of squeezing towels and mops into buckets we had it all dried up. But for the next few hours I will be blowdrying all the wet books.
More pictures inside the post.
jullie appartement is na dat dweilen waarschijnlijk net zo mooi als de schuur. wat een hels karwei was dat. wij mogen iig niet meer naar de boeddhistenhemel, met al die spinnen die we gisteren hebben vermoord, dan wel ont-huist. de schuur is nog nooit zo schoon geweest…
en ik merk dat jij net zoveel zin hebt in je verjaardag als ik. kunnen we de voorpret delen.
kusje, je zusje
Haha, I think Buddhist heaven was already closed to me since my experiment with the swimming bunnies. Though maybe they still judge you like a minor at that age. And at the farm at least you don’t have fake wood floors but nice easy-to-spray-clean asphalt. If you move the furniture here now it’s like you’re going over speed bumps.
hoi Paul, hopelijk niet te laat, maar hier is het recept voor mokka of chocolade creme. 100 gr boter of ongezouten margarine vermengen met 100 gram poedersuiker en 1 1/2 dl koffieextract. ( 2 eetlepels oploskoffie op 1 1/2 dl warm water, wat daarna weer af moet koelen) . Dit goed met elkaar vermengen ( mixer of lepel)
Wil je chocolade creme, dan inplaats van koffieextract 3 eetlepels cacao nemen en evt wat extra suiker en ook met elkaar vermengen. Dit smeren tussen 2 biscuitjes. Niet te dun! Grotjes, mamma
Heya Paul! 1AM here, and guess what: it’s your birthday! I already sent you a message on Facebook, but because apparently that doesn’t work as well over there as we’re used to over here, I figured I’d also congratulate you through your own website. Hope you’re having a fun day! See you in a week… x Pieter
Ehm – right, forgot the point of the message: Congrats!
hey kid happy b-day I posted a video of me and my guitar playing you my sucky version of happy birthday!!! I’ve only had 3 lesson so bear with me. =D Hope your enjoying every moment XX
Yo,
Gefeliciflapstaart en we bellen!
Kus,
Clien
Heyyy Happy Birthday! ga je nog iets leuks doen dan vandaag?x
Hey Paul,
Nogmaals gefeliciteerd met je verjaardag he!
Groetjes, Bas