Never in my life had I dreamed that I would be a statistic as a flood victim. Let me recall this memory. It's as if it just happened yesterday. I remembered it was after MUET and PMR. It was approaching Deepavali. Yes, I remembered because Silvan told us the temple at the stadium was flooded. Sometimes, Allah tested you yet with all His compassion and mercy, He simplified it according to your accord. Oh...so many times I wanted to give up yet the strength and patience He gave managed to pull us through.
It started with continuous rain with a steady downpour. You know the kind of rain where there was no thunder or strong winds ... just consistent down pour like grieving. Non-stop, depressing and disheartening. As usual, the flood did not start during the rain. We heard that Thailand had to release their dams due to overflow of water in their dams. This meant the water would flow into Perlis and Kelantan being at the border. We also heard that Kedah was releasing the waters from the Pedu dam. This meant an overflow of water into the local rivers and canals. Our main road was being upgraded. KTM electric railway line was under progress. These added to the clogging of rivers and the padi fields waterways. Thus, in the hot sun, quietly, surely and quickly the water rose suddenly. It always happened in the early morning hours. Since Noor slept late, he noticed water seeping through the cracks at the doors. The kind of rushing in without any invitation. Steadily, continuously.
The next morning we saw that the main road of our neighbourhood was already flooded. We faced this flood every year but up to ankle height and since the last two years it was quite bad but we never had to move out of our houses. I still went to school. By the third day, over the weekend, the water slowly rose. We heard that the housing areas where floods never occurred was already knee deep flooded. Alor Setar town was already flooded. Our house was steadily getting flooded by the fourth day. We had moved our cars to the Petronas petrol station on the main road. Everything that could be put on something higher like bricks or chairs or tables were uplifted. There was nobody home except the two of us thus there was nobody to ask for help. The water came in through the toilets, the drains and the overflowing river near our houses. You can imagine the dirty, murky black coloured waters. It was already up to the knees. We were told to move out due to the interruption of water and electric supply. We were lucky (Allah was very kind to us). We did not have to go to the evacuation centre at SMK Simpang Kuala. Shita (Noor's sister in-law) had just rented a house near Alor Mengkudu and it was empty being prepared for her new nursery branch. I was very grateful since I did not fancy staying with hundreds other families in the school hall.
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| My neighbour's car at the back part of the house |
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| Looking at the never receding water but steadily rising and refusing to move out..;-( It's a split level but the higher part was already covered with water |
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| Our house was the end lot next to the "apple" tree - the water was already thigh high |
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| The river on the right had already overflowed onto the main road leading to the housing area |
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It was depressing. We heard that Jitra was worse than us in Alor Setar. Alor Setar town was closed for 3 days until the water started to recede to allow cars to pass through. The town was at a standstill. Business closed down and was badly affected since the low lying shops were also flooded including Kamdar. Noor's shop was closed for the three days. I did not go to school for the whole week. We were told by the people who visited us to apply for "cuti banjir" which entitled us for the duration of the flood. When I went to school after 10 days, I found out that Khoo and Sultan were also flood victims. So, we went together to settle our leave.
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