And it Starts

The typhoon Basyang passed though Manila last evening. It was supposed to be Signal 1 category but turned out to be Signal 3 and it was expected to bypass Manila but it did not. Rukmini wanted to get out of the rooms so we went next door for ice cream . When we left, we looked out of the window and the scene downstairs looked perfectly alright, the mall was open and there were people moving along the road. Only the next day did we realize that we had taken a bit of a chance. Luckily she was happy with a cup of ice cream which she did not even finish. By then I was a bit worried about t he winds whipping up and the increased rain. We rushed back to the hotel, just in time. The rest of the night, the wind howled and the rain crashed down. There was a power outage at midnight which continued through the next day but which we did not sense as the powerful generators of the hotel were on.
There was widespread damage in the city, mostly trees having fallen on the road or on houses and on electric lines. At 8 in the morning I went to the vegetable market with a friend. It was only later in the day that we heard about the anger of the new president at the weathermen for missing this completely. Also thanked our lucky stars that nothing came crashing down on us!
The market we went to was very much like Crawford market, flowers, fruit, vegetables and in the back, meat and fish. After that interesting trip where I bought lots of fruit and veg we were quite exhausted. So we went off to Meenal’s lovely bungalow and then onwards to Starbucks for a cappuccino. After that we went to Hypermarket for a round of groceries. By the time I got home it was noon and soon after I had to be off to view houses. Just after viewing 5, my mind was made up. Same old same old.