Originally Posted by
GeorgeBMac
Hopedully this is not off-thread but -- I have been volunteering for the Red Cross for about 5 years. I mostly stay local but once ventured out for a 2 week stay on a large flooding disaster in West Virgina. And, I find that people just keep on amazing me with their strength, resiliancy and fortitude: From the man standing in front of the home that just burned to the ground with his son asking where his toys are, to the lady in West Virgina who had nothing -- but when asked if she needed help said: "Oh, don't worry about me..." And, when I said: "I see the water line -- you just had 3 feet of water in your one story home?" She replied: "Oh we'll just tack up some new paneling, we'll be fine".
I hope that I will have the strength that those people had when "my turn comes". (But I doubt it).
Since the beginning of 2009, I've lived through a bushfire that destroyed my home, killed 34 people in a nearby town and 173 overall. Then we had floods, although they didn't have a direct impact on us, but still resulted in extra effort at work, and a great deal of tension as it was unknown how and when the peak river flows would arrive.
Then more major flooding to the north of us that submerged many homes, cutting off families for days, and causing extensive damage to homes.
Australians are renowned for their resilience. It's a matter of pulling together, or else you'd just go crazy.
I still get emotional when I see what others have gone through. We are at Blairmore on Crowsnest Pass (near the US-Canadian border) this weekend. This area is famous for the Frank rock slide disaster than killed over 100 people in 1903. I had tears in my eyes reading about it, because... well, I can personally relate to that sort of disaster.