Cyclone Evan Day 3

Cyclone Evan Day 3
The third day without electricity and not seeing any electricity around as most generators had broken because of the flooding had warranted us to keep phones off and only turn them to check for a message and quickly shut them off again.  I had received a message that the Peace Corps office was having their office clean up and I decided to join them.
I was happy to see that a majority of the flooding was gone from town, however I still had to trudge through mud halfway up to my knees to reach the Peace Corps office.  We were greeted with shovels and brooms and saw that basically the entire office still had muddy water, or just plain mud about 2-3 inches deep.  Over a dozen of us got to work with whatever we could find to clean up what we could.
Using dishes to scoop up and carry the mud outside, sweeping and shoveling it away, and throwing away any damaged materials that could not be salvaged, it was gruesome and tiring, but we felt proud seeing what we could accomplish.   I had not spent much time prior with the new volunteers being as they had just completed training, so it was a great opportunity to bond with them and get to know them.
We endured blisters, but had as much fun as we could as the Peace Corps office became a giant messy Slip N Slide for the day.
When I got home, I began my usual task of water collections.  We are really lucky as to where we live because although we are on a hill, there is a wall blocking some of the hill above us.  That wall has several holes that “clean” groundwater was pouring out from.  That water was amazing as it kept us clean (which is something you need when every day you are covered in mud!), bathed us, was able to go in our toilets and used for everything, aside from drinking of course.  We had several buckets that I would fill and then call up to my husband to come and bring the water to our house.  It was a great system.
Cyclone Evan was bad, but I felt confident that if I could continue to get water like this, I can endure the lack of electricity for awhile.

Down power lines on the road

More down power lines

Mud inside a house

destroyed trees