24 hours

Life after a flood

By Thomas Feng

October 18^th, 2017

I knew something was wrong when water was gushing down the entrance of my apartment building. Five minutes prior, I was walking home from a solo trip to the movies; a peaceful time of solitude which I indulge in occasionally to provoke thought.

"Do you live in Unit 11?" one of the residents frantically rushed out to open the door for me. "Your apartment is flooded."

Did I leave the washing machine on? Had I left the tap running? I thought about all the possible ways I could have been at fault. It couldn't have been that bad. I had only been out for a couple of hours.

As I opened the door my feet dipped ankle-deep into a pool of hopelessness. My hot water main had burst without warning. It was 11pm on a Saturday night. The neighbours and I gasped.

After figuring out how to turn off the hot water main ourselves, we tried calling various restorers and gathered as many towels and buckets lying around to soak up as much moisture as we could ourselves.

Two hours and an awkward 1am phone call with the landlord later, six industrial fans and three dehumidifiers were out in full force airing out the water. For the next three hours, the restorer would use super-sucker vacuums and drain out 250L of water from the surface of the carpet while I drank tea with my next door neighbour. It was a catastrophe.

I moved all of my furniture into the sun-room and the few dry patches in the bedroom. I fell asleep at 5.30 surrounded by white noise.

The next morning, I woke up moping before deciding that I needed to leave the house as there wasn't much I could do but wait.

I made Vegemite on toast and read an Oh Comely magazine in the gardens for an hour. It reminded me of the little things.

I went for a bike ride in the afternoon and rode past a lady feeding her cockatoo on the street and through the various network of laneways in South Yarra and Prahran.

An elderly resident in the housing estate nearby tended to her blooming garden.

I walked to the train station with a suitcase and an oversized tote bag as I moved into my parents' place for two weeks. My dad made me a special vegan stir fry and mum brewed her best tea.

Life has been crazy this year. It was a reminder that you can't control what happens to you in life. Life goes on and you have to do the best with what you have. Even if it is just the little things.

How have you dealt with household emergencies? Write to me at t.feng95@gmail.com

I'm currently sitting in Sydney airport, waiting to board a plane to Bolivia. I'll be away for three and a half weeks but will hopefully be writing every now and then.