Red Trucks · 12 September 2002
Looking at the effect of Monday’s floods, it’s clear we were unbelievably lucky compared to others in the Cévennes – there were deaths in nearby towns; some people are still without running water or electricity; damage to roads, homes and businesses will take ages to clean up.
Right down the road, the incredibly accommodating and genial couple to whom we pay rent had finished renovating their ground floor just in time to see the work destroyed, along with their furnace, laundry appliances and much else. Their yard – and these are fastidiously tidy people – is still littered with ruined furniture and waterlogged mattresses.
Two lingering things, from the day:
One. Later on, the power and phone still out, I drove to Montpellier to rejuvenate in the sweet electric glow of the mall (er, to replace the defective DVD player). I was shaken but still quite clueless about the actual extent of the damage done and the number of people affected.
On the road south I passed a convoy heading back in the direction I came from: dozens of emergency response vehicles, some carrying bulldozers, some with paramedics, each one from a different small town further south. Carcassonne. Castelnau. St Gely du Fesc. Red truck after red truck, lights flashing, determined eyes behind the wheel. I sort of, ah, burst into tears.
Two. I can offer perhaps no better addendum to January’s glib compendium of French driving tips than the following: returning from town just as the flash flood hit, there was a dip in the road, about fifteen metres long, under an indefinite depth of rushing water. I was of course nervous and, not knowing if the road underneath was intact or if the car could be carried away, proceeding through it with slow caution.
Right behind me was one of the ubiquitous, seemingly disposable white Peugeots – standard issue to the young, inbred white male – that swarm the roads here; its driver honking, cursing, tailgating.
* * *