International Nesties
dulcemariamar1
member
Dear Community,
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Have you experienced a natural disaster?
I have been through a couple of hurricanes and blizzards. Nothing too serious.
Re: Have you experienced a natural disaster?
Actually experienced: any number of tropical storms; two Category 1 hurricanes, one Category 2 hurricane, the remnants of a Category 3 hurricane at sea, the remnants of a Nor'Easter at sea, the remnants of Hurricane Andrew, and an F2 tornado touching down 3 blocks away.
I evacuated for Hurricane Katrina two days before landfall and was out of my house for 6 weeks on what has come to be called Hurrication. While on hurrication, I experienced the remnants of Rita as it passed over the area I was. I was back in New Orleans 6 weeks after the storm and experienced firsthand most of the clean-up and rebuilding in the city.
We just had an earthquake on Sunday night, not major, 4.9.
I've also experienced some bad flooding and a pretty bad tropical storm while in Vietnam, Hoi An to be exact. I was at one of our hotels on business and had to help evacuate guests from the beachfront bungalows to the rooms further from the beach.
I remember the Seattle earthquake - just a bit of damage to my office building in Vancouver (I was running down the stairs and didn't feel it), we were in Seattle visiting family the next day and saw some more damage down there.
That's crazy about Hurricane Katrina. Was your home fine? And your things?
I've been in a few tornadoes, but I'm from Southern Illinois, it's a normal part of life. I've only experienced minor damage (trees down, power lines down, etc). I've been stuck in airports due to blizzards for a couple days.
I was in one earthquake a few years ago, a 5.6. It was shocking to feel in Southern Illinois! It happened around 4 am. My dog woke me up by barking then the entire house started shaking. I was very confused for a moment then I realized what it was and walked out of my room to find my roomate.Only a few things fell off the mantle and counters, but some older homes had damage. When I was a teenager I felt another earthquake but it was small and quick.
I also went to Thailand to help with tsunami clean up. I was there 2 months after, in Kho Phi Phi and Phuket. It was a life changing experience. I volunteered with clean up in Kho Phi Phi and at an orphanage for sea gypsy children thats lost their parents in the tsunami. The children were without passports, etc because they had spent their whole lives on boats and most of them had lost their entire families. The Thai gov't had taken them in and they were placed with other members of their community. We helped build them houses on land and set up a school.
That sounds heartbreaking. How did you get involved in volunteering? I hope it felt like you were making a difference--otherwise I think I would have just been crying every night!
I was going on a study abroad in Bangkok in January and this happened right before we left. Our itenary was changed so that we could volunteer. I felt like we helped, especially with the clean up and building the homes. The children, though they had lost everything were some of the strongest people I have ever met. We often would just sit with the kids and discuss how they felt, etc.
That's a striking story and a very noble gesture. I always fantasized about volunteering like you did, it's definitely on my bucket list.
I've been in a few hurricanes, most recently Hurricane Ike in 2008 in Houston. Luckily we didn't have any real damage to our property. Just some large tree branches down. But we were without power for 17 days. We were among the last in the city to get power back to our home; even last in our neighborhood because our part of the grid had a blown transformer.
Also I got stuck out in Tropical Storm Allison in 2001. It had been raining a lot that day, but I was clueless that it was a TS. Some friends and I went to the movies. Afterward I dropped my friends off and started to drive home and got stranded. I luckily was able to make it to a park and ride where there was a pay phone, because my cell was dead. My friend could only get as close as half a mile away or so, even with his gigantic truck, so he waded in thigh-deep water to come get me--had to leave my car. It got a bit flooded, but I was luckily able to park up on a median in the grass, so it only reached the bottom of the doors.
Yes.
Experienced the earthquake in Hawaii in 2006 (morning after our wedding!) and the big earthquake that spawned the tsunami in 2011 in Japan (we were at the airport in Tokyo when it happened).
Also, been through 2 hurricanes in Hawaii (one in '94 and another when I was itty-bitty in the early 80s).
a girl from Hawaii, living the expat experience in India.
3 hurricanes (all category 1 or 2 so nothing huge; just hung out the basement for a bit) & 1 tornado (spent half the night in the basement of a hotel in Kansas; that was fun). I was also stuck in Quebec for 3 days more than I had planned on staying due to an ice storm a couple years ago but that was kind of fun.
DH's parents live in southern Tamil Nadu, India & were affected by the '04 tsunami. It was wild to look @ pics of their huge coconut tree plantation from before & see it after in '09 with just a few trees left. FIL was a uni prof & his campus was right near the beach, maybe half a mile away. He was on campus when the waves hit & got stranded on the roof of his dept for a few hours. If he would've been driving @ the time he could have easily been swept away.
We had a one-in-a-century flood in our town when W was 2 months old. We had to camp out on the 3rd floor landing of our apartment building overnight, and our neighbours lost everything. It was 30ft above normal high tide.