a flood

There’s never a dull moment here and if I ever complained that there was nothing to do, shame on me! Monday evening we found plenty to do. A nasty thunderstorm rolled in at about 515pm as Nede and I were preparing to go to our friend Stina’s house for dinner. Nede is terrified of thunder so, as usual, she practically glues herself to me and nestles her head so tight into my chest I fear her respiratory status. We were sitting at the desk chair when I finally thought, “why don’t we move to where there aren’t so many windows where we can’t see and hear the severity of this storm?” In an attempt to console Nede, I was singing any and every song I could think of (am really wishing I had been blessed with a better singing voice for Nede’s sake!). We went to sit in the hallway and after sometime and Nede was actually dozing off, I started to think that that floor looked really shiny. My first thought was that Mirriam really polished the floors well last week. I finally got up to see and, much to my surprise my feet were walking through inches of water! The ceiling in one of the spare bedrooms had a torrential rain coming through it! And so did the second bedroom! I had no idea what to do. Nede was screaming concern as to where Brother Marc and Uncle George are going to sleep when they arrive in a week, followed by a bazillion other questions as she continued to refuse stand on her own. Without choice I had to put her on my back and start mopping. To make a long evening short, I called my friends and before I knew it there were 5 of us sweeping and mopping massive amounts of water out of the house, followed by the dinner that they brought with them!

Nede clearly enjoyed it far more than any of the rest of us:

Upon my assessment on the top of the roof (thanks to my friends leading up the tree and onto the roof) I think this is a problem that will only occur with crazy storms like we had. There are definitely a couple of issues that need to be dealt with. It’s no fun waking to every rain fall wondering if it’s going to happen again. So, if anyone knows some dependable, honest, hardworking cement workers in the Chimoio area, I would love to have their number!