flood

and now, the blog can finally resume its regular activities. had my little village on the telly last night, in a new debate program on the public channel. it was about big floods, and i remember all too well the floods on my homeland eleven years ago, in the evening of november the fifth.

remember, remember, the fifth of november...

i remember a storm powerful as probably no other that i've seen in my entire life. i remember leaving odemira in the bus, it was raining pretty heavily already. i remember the streams along the way running wildly and threatening the bridges along the road - in that road, no bridge was left standing when the rain was over. i remember arriving at my village's downtown, and my mother there, waiting for me, telling me to call a friend of mine who lived in the countryside. he had to stay with me that night, because the flood had already cut the access to his home. i remember walking home under rain and wind and lightning. i remember power going off, not to return in the next days.

fortunately, my home was not affected by the rain or the flood. yet i remember leaving home in the following morning and going downtown. and it seemed that we had been bombed or something like that. there was mud and debris all over the place. shops were thoroughly destroyed by the force of the water. cars were smashed against concrete walls. and concrete walls went down. seeing the images of the wreackage was good and weitd at the same time. good because now i know how we got over it. weird because the images brought back a memory that no one who were there in that evening will ever forget.