Hi everyone!

Just wanted to write a quick note because I saw that Esme posted about our current situation in the Philippines on her blog: http://chocolateandcroissants.blogspot.com/

Okay, just an update for those living outside the Philippines:
Last Saturday, our country was hit by a typhoon [a hurricane to those who live in the US]. We normally have five categories for storms:
Signal # 1-5, which ranges from the wind speed brought about by the typhoon.

Manila was tagged under Signal # 1 last Saturday.

So to residents, it wasn't much of a big deal. We experience typhoons from June till September so it wasn't really that much of a big deal. Until the rains poured in.
It started raining Friday afternoon, and it didn't stop until Sunday morning.

Apparently in a span of hours, the typhoon Ketsana dumped more rain in Manila than Hurricane Katrina & low-lying areas were immediately flooded.

What's scary was that the flood just came out of nowhere. Areas that never experienced flooding before were suddenly filled with water. Water levels rushed up quite quickly, it caught everyone by surprise.

Thankfully we're still okay. Our kitchen got flooded because the grounds outside cannot take the water in anymore, but we managed to get the water out of our house by Saturday evening. The outside of our village was knee-deep in water, and we never experienced that kind of flooding before.

Some friends got stranded, others tried their best to save what they had.

It was a good thing we had supplies of food. We lost electricity for a few hours but it was turned on again, which prompted us to charge our mobile phones and batteries for flashlights.

At the moment, there is another super typhoon that is headed to the Philippines, it will hit the Northern part of Luzon but it is expected to bring rainfall again. And to think that other areas still have floodwaters in the area.

I guess I could say that I am quite lucky. There isn't much damage to our house [except for a door that expanded with the flood water and can't be closed anymore], as compared to what my fellow Filipinos have suffered.

But like everything, we will rebuild and we are thankful that most of us are still alive.

Haven't been reading much books lately, so updates and/or reviews would be posted as soon as I can.

Thank you so much for all your overwhelming messages!