More storms today have brought the temperature down to seventeen degrees at 5pm. The recent new additions to the garden (three miniature geraniums, a pineapple sage (smells like not looks like) another rose and a lantana) are very happy.
As a mere slip of a twenty-something Mama (before she was Mama) took a life-changing journey to Southeast Asia. During a prolonged visit to an island off the coast of southern Thailand, teaching a bit of English, learning some Thai, she found out many things about herself and about life. Accommodation was a palm-thatch cottage on stilts on the beach, and food was arranged by the proprietor in a large 'restaurant' area - a large palm-wood skeleton with a cement floor and no walls. Gap-year kids who are reading this will probably recognise the scenario, although at the time, the 'gap-year' was a thing of the future.
One day, our host, an attractive, tallish Thai was to be seen frowning at the horizon. The fishing boats that usually twinkled their lights at night from the far-distance had suddenly turned-tail for home. There was the start of a swell along our normally tranquil stretch of the Gulf of Thailand, and the normally azure skies were starting to look murky. Within a couple of hours a storm blew up which lasted two days and two nights. The sea bubbled below my bed and the wind bent the palms to horizontal. The inland lake burst out and water came crashing down to meet the sea sending, one beach hut sprawling. The noise of wind, rain, moaning palms and thundering ocean was deafening. The restaurant owner unfurled long swathes of heavy canvas and secured them to the ground so that damp customers could eat with only a faint mist of rain surrounding them.
On the third day the wind abated and the rain came to a reluctant halt. Houses were turned inside out as possessions were taken out into the sun to dry - mattresses, clothes...
It was only very much later that I discovered we had been sitting ducks for Typhoon Gay, which devastated Thailand's Chumpon province in late 1989. Hundreds of people died, and hundreds of fishermen went missing. We were lucky.
This afternoon, I and about 50 parents and children found ourselves huddled under a canvas awning in a corner of Cannobio's parco giochi, frowning in much the same way as my Thai friend of so many years ago. A sudden cloud burst had brought 4-year-old Emanuele's birthday celebrations to an awed halt, and there was rather a lot of water swirling around our feet. As we hauled our kids up onto the table and put Emanuele's mountain of birthday gifts out of harm's way, I thought of how much work my guardian angel has had to put in over the years (thank-you). I hoped that after shielding me from 190km/h winds and a roiling sea, he would be ready for the relatively minor task of helping us back along the lake road and up the hill, safe and sound, and perhaps not too wet.
He was.
Sunday, 6 July 2008
Storm story
More storms today have brought the temperature down to seventeen degrees at 5pm. The recent new additions to the garden (three miniature geraniums, a pineapple sage (smells like not looks like) another rose and a lantana) are very happy.
As a mere slip of a twenty-something Mama (before she was Mama) took a life-changing journey to Southeast Asia. During a prolonged visit to an island off the coast of southern Thailand, teaching a bit of English, learning some Thai, she found out many things about herself and about life. Accommodation was a palm-thatch cottage on stilts on the beach, and food was arranged by the proprietor in a large 'restaurant' area - a large palm-wood skeleton with a cement floor and no walls. Gap-year kids who are reading this will probably recognise the scenario, although at the time, the 'gap-year' was a thing of the future.
One day, our host, an attractive, tallish Thai was to be seen frowning at the horizon. The fishing boats that usually twinkled their lights at night from the far-distance had suddenly turned-tail for home. There was the start of a swell along our normally tranquil stretch of the Gulf of Thailand, and the normally azure skies were starting to look murky. Within a couple of hours a storm blew up which lasted two days and two nights. The sea bubbled below my bed and the wind bent the palms to horizontal. The inland lake burst out and water came crashing down to meet the sea sending, one beach hut sprawling. The noise of wind, rain, moaning palms and thundering ocean was deafening. The restaurant owner unfurled long swathes of heavy canvas and secured them to the ground so that damp customers could eat with only a faint mist of rain surrounding them.
On the third day the wind abated and the rain came to a reluctant halt. Houses were turned inside out as possessions were taken out into the sun to dry - mattresses, clothes...
It was only very much later that I discovered we had been sitting ducks for Typhoon Gay, which devastated Thailand's Chumpon province in late 1989. Hundreds of people died, and hundreds of fishermen went missing. We were lucky.
This afternoon, I and about 50 parents and children found ourselves huddled under a canvas awning in a corner of Cannobio's parco giochi, frowning in much the same way as my Thai friend of so many years ago. A sudden cloud burst had brought 4-year-old Emanuele's birthday celebrations to an awed halt, and there was rather a lot of water swirling around our feet. As we hauled our kids up onto the table and put Emanuele's mountain of birthday gifts out of harm's way, I thought of how much work my guardian angel has had to put in over the years (thank-you). I hoped that after shielding me from 190km/h winds and a roiling sea, he would be ready for the relatively minor task of helping us back along the lake road and up the hill, safe and sound, and perhaps not too wet.
He was.
As a mere slip of a twenty-something Mama (before she was Mama) took a life-changing journey to Southeast Asia. During a prolonged visit to an island off the coast of southern Thailand, teaching a bit of English, learning some Thai, she found out many things about herself and about life. Accommodation was a palm-thatch cottage on stilts on the beach, and food was arranged by the proprietor in a large 'restaurant' area - a large palm-wood skeleton with a cement floor and no walls. Gap-year kids who are reading this will probably recognise the scenario, although at the time, the 'gap-year' was a thing of the future.
One day, our host, an attractive, tallish Thai was to be seen frowning at the horizon. The fishing boats that usually twinkled their lights at night from the far-distance had suddenly turned-tail for home. There was the start of a swell along our normally tranquil stretch of the Gulf of Thailand, and the normally azure skies were starting to look murky. Within a couple of hours a storm blew up which lasted two days and two nights. The sea bubbled below my bed and the wind bent the palms to horizontal. The inland lake burst out and water came crashing down to meet the sea sending, one beach hut sprawling. The noise of wind, rain, moaning palms and thundering ocean was deafening. The restaurant owner unfurled long swathes of heavy canvas and secured them to the ground so that damp customers could eat with only a faint mist of rain surrounding them.
On the third day the wind abated and the rain came to a reluctant halt. Houses were turned inside out as possessions were taken out into the sun to dry - mattresses, clothes...
It was only very much later that I discovered we had been sitting ducks for Typhoon Gay, which devastated Thailand's Chumpon province in late 1989. Hundreds of people died, and hundreds of fishermen went missing. We were lucky.
This afternoon, I and about 50 parents and children found ourselves huddled under a canvas awning in a corner of Cannobio's parco giochi, frowning in much the same way as my Thai friend of so many years ago. A sudden cloud burst had brought 4-year-old Emanuele's birthday celebrations to an awed halt, and there was rather a lot of water swirling around our feet. As we hauled our kids up onto the table and put Emanuele's mountain of birthday gifts out of harm's way, I thought of how much work my guardian angel has had to put in over the years (thank-you). I hoped that after shielding me from 190km/h winds and a roiling sea, he would be ready for the relatively minor task of helping us back along the lake road and up the hill, safe and sound, and perhaps not too wet.
He was.
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