The Perfect Storm
So, as it turns out, living in a secluded village on an island isn't ALWAYS that awesome especially if there's a typhoon (er even a tropical storm) in the area. ANd extra expecially if there's only one road to the village and it's impassible due to fallen trees and you have a flight to catch that's a 3-4 hour bus ride away. ANd super extra especially when fish from the ocean are blown into the village by the strong winds and left to flip flop and die.
A few days ago, I noticed a few signs posted with the message T-1, or Typhoon 1 (similar to our hurricane scale, though the typhoon scale goes up to 10). Nothing major, I thought. It was just a bit cloudy, but otherwise just a hot, muggy day. Te next day the signs said T-3. Again, nothing too alarming, I assumed. (I hadn't been checking the news at all, since I have to pay for my internet access, so these assumptions rested on little apart from my hope that my travel plans would not have to be altered.) Then, last night, after we had gotten back to the village, and as the winds started whipping up and rain started falling more heavily, this was bumped up to a T-8. I obviouly didn't sleep too well, and when I woke up, there was no public transportarion operating between the vilage and the rest of HK, and even private cars were unable to get out. Clearly, I would miss my morning meeting, and indeed when I called the office no one was present, as most of HK apparently took a day off, juding by the eerily empty metro. Eventually, one lane of the road was cleared, and I hopped on a (price-gouging) minibus to rush to the bus station to make it to the airport.
Because my cell phone was dead and my host did not have internet access, I had no idea where I would be spending the night, but luckily I have arrived in CHengdu with only an hour delay, and I was able to find another person via couchsurfing to host me. I'm still not sure how the volunteering will work out, but I will keep you updated. So far, I really like the city. As it's in the South, it has a natural tendency to be more relaxed, and this certainly holds true for Chengdu. It's a large city (5 million or more), but it has such a small-town feel that it's really not too intimidating at all.
I'll leave you with a quotaion I heard last night:
"He's the least Italian-looking, Japanese person in the world." Uh-huh.
A few days ago, I noticed a few signs posted with the message T-1, or Typhoon 1 (similar to our hurricane scale, though the typhoon scale goes up to 10). Nothing major, I thought. It was just a bit cloudy, but otherwise just a hot, muggy day. Te next day the signs said T-3. Again, nothing too alarming, I assumed. (I hadn't been checking the news at all, since I have to pay for my internet access, so these assumptions rested on little apart from my hope that my travel plans would not have to be altered.) Then, last night, after we had gotten back to the village, and as the winds started whipping up and rain started falling more heavily, this was bumped up to a T-8. I obviouly didn't sleep too well, and when I woke up, there was no public transportarion operating between the vilage and the rest of HK, and even private cars were unable to get out. Clearly, I would miss my morning meeting, and indeed when I called the office no one was present, as most of HK apparently took a day off, juding by the eerily empty metro. Eventually, one lane of the road was cleared, and I hopped on a (price-gouging) minibus to rush to the bus station to make it to the airport.
Because my cell phone was dead and my host did not have internet access, I had no idea where I would be spending the night, but luckily I have arrived in CHengdu with only an hour delay, and I was able to find another person via couchsurfing to host me. I'm still not sure how the volunteering will work out, but I will keep you updated. So far, I really like the city. As it's in the South, it has a natural tendency to be more relaxed, and this certainly holds true for Chengdu. It's a large city (5 million or more), but it has such a small-town feel that it's really not too intimidating at all.
I'll leave you with a quotaion I heard last night:
"He's the least Italian-looking, Japanese person in the world." Uh-huh.
posted by Mysteries of The Orient at 8:27 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home