Ondoy Stories III

We decided to spend the day at school as there is power, space for the kids to run and a TV in Steve's office. Ironically, with all the flood water, we went swimming too!

I and some friends went to the supermarket. We got there right as it opened but the car park was already the fullest I had ever seen it (it's only a small car park, but still!). No ATMs were working which was a problem as I only had 500 pesos on me. Luckily, I had brought a generous friend who lent me enough to get some basics. We whipped round the supermarket but even in the time we were there the long-life milk disappeared, the bread aisles emptied and the tinned meat/fish also went fast.

The queues are long - we combine all our bits into one trolley so I don't feel guilty about sharing our spot in the queue and it takes us about 45 minutes to get through the till, even as they open others. I have never been in a run on a shop before.

We get back to school and are delighted to have internet access. We start looking at the news sites and are amazed at what we are seeing and reading. My internet didn't work well for some reason and that was frustrating because I couldn't send emails and reassure people - it was pretty obvious it had made international news and they were mentioning Cainta so I knew family and friends would be worried because it was specific and not the usual generic Philippines disaster news that ends up being on some island thousands of miles away.

We have found our groove now. We charge up the computers and watch a DVD with the kids after dinner, then we watch one when they are in bed.