Flood on 3rd Floor

It was yet another exhausting day in office. Why does management keeps these boring meeting just when you are about to leave for home. But I wasn’t keen on going home either as my wife wasn’t there in Town. As expected it was a Boring, Loooooong & Non-fruitful (one of the many corporate words I recently learned) meeting.

I was out for home at 9:00 pm from office. Actually I like when it’s late as the roads are Lonely, which are totally pack house in the “Office time”. Getting ready procedure for home is like: Mobile-Check, Jacket-Check, I-pod check (Favorite play list-Check). And the journey begins.

It’s really amazing, the ride on empty road with your favorite songs, this is the time when you actually hear the lyrics. When you are at peace we feel time flies by & other way round. The fact is Time always maintains its pace; it’s just the dilemma heart over head.

As it was late & assuming that my “Mess” in my apartment won’t entertain me, I choose to have Chinese stuff for take-away on the journey home.

First thing I do as I reach home was to call my family back home. It’s a daily routine since the day I am away from home for Studies or Job (Frankly speaking this is the best time of the day just to hear the voice of your dear ones).

Finished with the call & lunch, the next thing I always tend to do is to surf all the channels (So many of them these days). After a while I remembered that it was an EPL (English premier league) night & how can I miss it. Manchester united (The team I support) was going through a tough stage with Moyes on sideline as the Manager. Similar scenario continued; but just to my satisfaction it was a Draw (at least 1 point to the tally was somewhat encouraging those days).

My irony was, I always plan to sleep early so that I can wake up early for some exercise but it never happens as planned (That’s Life) and here I was sleeping yet again late credits to office meeting & Football.

Even though there was a Bed in hall, I always use to sleep in bedroom on the floor as I had a spare mattress. Just lie down & surrender yourself to the worlds of dream but the happening thing “Whatsapp”, just when you are about to sleep, messages start to hamper your night. (From N number of groups, so many of them; School mates, College mates, Batch mates, Class mates, Colony friends, Company colleagues etc etc etc.)

My day usually ends with a Long good night chat with my Wife & Friends.

ALARM: It’s the most important & frequently used application in my Mobile (Actually it’s a life savoir). For a person like me to wakeup without an Alarm is like Mission Impossible. I have almost 4-5 alarms with break of 10-10 minutes in between. (Although Snooze option does exists; but why take chances).

That was the end as I activate the alarms. A good night Sleep.

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I have habit to wake up just 2-3 minutes before the alarms ruin my sleep; but this wasn't the case that day.

I was on the mattress sleeping on my stomach.

I was little awake by the sound of Water. I was back to normal position (I searched for my mobile near the pillow, but it wasn’t there. I again went to sleep.

After a while when I was just rolling on the Bed, my hand went over the bed & I felt Cold so Cold; I was awake in a Shock. I couldn’t believe my senses. “THERE WAS WATER ALL OVER THE PLACE.”

Unable to believe what has happened I rubbed my eyes twice but the scene dint changed. I was expecting it’s just a Bad dream but had already arrived in my home.

Sweet & Simple : Not a Smart Phone Enthusiastic   

Again to my weirdest imagination I thought is there a flood and half the city has drowned as I was on the 3^rd Floor of the building. I opened the bedroom door & the water spilled inside. Just imagine the scene where is handcuffed in a room & unlocks the door, remember the water pouring inside, it was a similar case. I saw my mobile just beside my mattress totally drowned in water. I grabbed it in a rush but it was all messed up. First thing I did was removed the battery, SIM & placed it in window safe from water.

The scene in Hall was horrifying. Water was upto the threshold of Flat. I opened the main entrance door in fear that water was pouring from outside But it was total dry outside not a single drop of water. I closed the door immediately as someone might pop inside.

I Wonder where the water came from I went inside. In the bathroom I saw and to my surprise this was the place which was making the room a lake.

There is a 500 liter overhead water tank in Bathroom which also has a Overflow arrangement  through a pipe directly over the nhani trap. Society watchman usually starts the water flow, early morning just for half an hour. So I used to wake up early alternate days to start the valve to fill up the overhead tank.

All I can do was to curse myself to have kept the valve open last night (Why to spoil morning sleep for filling up the tank philosophy).

Somehow water bucket had skid over the Nhani trap & water from the overhead tank kept on pouring. The overflow was unable to dispense, so it was pouring all the way out from Bathroom to corridor, to bedroom, to kitchen, to hall up to the threshold level of hall.

I closed the valve & went outside for flood management. I had a smile when in hall because the “floaters” which we use in home were actually “floating” on the exact opposite corner than the place where they belong. They had made there first “floating journey” from one to other corner of hall.

Kitchen was no different scene but credits goes to my wife as nothing was lying on floor; everything was either on Kitchen platform or in the shelves.

I remembered my mattress & rushed inside. It was almost submerged under water & the place where I was sleeping was the only dry place on it. I lifted it & went outside embarrassingly, to keep in the common stair area for soaking. But as it was early morning it was quite with no one in the vicinity. I went inside to check the time; it was 6:30 AM in the morning.

I thought of calling my sister but my mobile was totally messed up. I sat on the bed in hall thinking what to do next. After a moment I had a solution which looked feasible right now. I went in bathroom to grab the water bucket. I was unable to find a bigger cloth in kitchen so that I can use is to collect water on the floor & rinse it in bucket. Wondering what to do I went in the bedroom to see if I can find something here. I saw my cloths hanging on the back of the door. I had to sacrifice my 2 T-shirts for rinsing the water in bucket. It was difficult thing. But I managed to find 2 such T-shirts for the flood management purpose.

Now here I was at 6:45 AM with 2 t-shirts & a water bucket and 3 rooms filled with water.

I was just putting 1 t-shirt on the left picking it up rinsing water in bucket then picking other wet t-shirt on the right picking it up rinsing water in bucket.

All I was doing for the next 2+ hours was:

Left-Right- Left-Right- Left-Right- Left-Right- empty Bucket in Toilet- Repeat

Left-Right- Left-Right- Left-Right- Left-Right- empty Bucket in Toilet- Repeat

Left-Right- Left-Right- Left-Right- Left-Right- empty Bucket in Toilet- Repeat

Exactly at 9:00 am I was finally done with the flood rescue mission. I put the ceiling fans in both rooms on full speed & had a sigh of relief.

My hands were wrinkled as if they were of 80 year old man.

For the first time I dint enjoyed my bath as I was in water for more than 2 hours. I got ready & first person I visited out from home was the “Barber”. I went & used his hair dryer to get rid of the water from my mobile. It was total dry in 2-3 minutes. My mobile spent its whole day in the window in office for a Sun bath.

It was an exhausted day and I dint had energy to walk around because of the sit-up exercise I did in the morning.

I switched ON my mobile while leaving the office in the evening. The Nokia startup sound gave me such a relief. I checked all the buttons & all the functions & to the surprise they were sound & working properly One of the good things about not using a Smart phone “its user & damage friendly”.

Back home early from office as I opened the Door I was very happy coz rooms looked extremely fresh & clean. I checked each & every room for wet areas but the Ceiling fans had done there work. The only thing which was wet was the Mattress lying outside. Looking at it I knew it will spend at least a week outside the flat.

Informing my family how the day started made them laugh. The only thing I heard lot was its good that this happened so my wife doesn’t have to clean the home at least for a month from now.

It was an experience which I would never like to have again. From then onwards, I sincerely check all the water taps (Just in case).

Just the thing I learned was “The treasure of life, learning.” 

Story no. 1