CATASTROPHE

Dear friends and family of Dave's Garden,
This will be a long rant, but please don't get bored by reading it, because this is the story of your old Wintermoor in Prague over the last couple of days. There is no need to reply to this post, as it is more of a statement, and witness to disaster, than something to which you should answer.
If you want to answer, then please start a new thread, as I would like to dedicate this thread to an old lady who I will never know.
Thank you.

As some, or many of you may know, I was in the music business in Germany over the last 24 years, organising the lives of artists on tour (Concert Promoter, Tour Manager). I took, what I thought to be, a well earned, semi-retirement… not bad for 52, I thought…, until a company came along and crossed my palm with many gold coins, and I couldn't refuse them.

This company organises galas, events, festivals and congresses, all over Europe. One of the congresses which we were to organise was a specialised medical congress in Prague, between the 1st, and 4th of October. Since I heard about the flooding in The Czech Republic, and especially Prague, I took it on myself to get my new partner to go to Prague with me, just to see if this congress would happen.

I have never ! ever seen ! and I hope never again to see the destruction of a city as I witnessed in Prague…..

PRAGUE (The Golden City): one of the most beautiful cities in inland Europe, an ancient city, under mud and silt, over 30.000 (THIRTY-THOUSAND) people moved, or dragged from their homes, and put into halls, tents, or anywhere where the authorities could look after them. This is a disaster area of the first degree… I actually witnessed an old lady being dragged forcefully by the Fire Brigade from her house, without anything but the clothes she was wearing, five minutes before her house disappeared under the rushing waters of the River Moldau !!
Our Congress Centre was also under water, so there was no chance of holding a congress in 5 weeks time, because the worst is still not over….. they await even more water.
Those poor people.
The whole city is not under water, of course, but the entire riverside region has disappeared, and is submerged in a mud and silt brew, which these people will not be able to clear from their houses for years. It isn't just drying the place, ALL of the walls must be freed of plaster, dried then re-plastered, just to get the dampness out of the houses. I couldn't afford to do that !!

On the way out of the Golden City by rubber dinghy, I started thinking about friends and acquaintances I have in other regions of Europe which are struck by these floods. Especially about a young couple I know in Austria, who I helped with a couple of Deutsch Marks, to start their own wee business… an auto repair shop, where the man needed some machinery to start….. We always got on well, since we had a bit of banter going, where he was the archetypal Papist, (being a good Catholic), and him calling me the Anti-Christ ( because of my Protestant Scottish upbringing), all differences being bridged by a wee bit of humour.
I found out tonight that there wee house, and business are under more than 6 metres (18 feet) of water…. I have contacted them, through a lot of phoning, (police, authorities etc), and the woman, and her two wee kids, will go to stay with other friends of mine in Munich until the worst is over.
Dresden in the old East Germany, will have more destruction than the British and Canadian bombers could have caused, if they had just kept dropping bombs on them just for fun for another month, day and night.
Those poor people…. I just kept saying this over, and over.

When I got back to my wee place here in Hamburg, I thought to myself "You lost 50 plants, these people have lost EVERYTHING".

I couldn't even start to tell my family what I had seen, I just said, "Catastrophe", then when we saw it on the news, I didn't realise it but I was weeping like a wee child. I was just so scared for those people down there.

I know that in the U.S. of A. you have terrible storms, tornados and all sort of natural catastrophes, but this is generally unknown in Europe, and especially as destructive as this, so no-one expects this to happen. Complete villages have just been taken over by the water masses.

I keep thinking about the old lady being dragged from her house, and thinking that she would maybe have preferred to go with her house, since her whole life was there…her furniture, her carpets on which her children played wee games, pictures of her man, her family, her father, her mother,.. all gone, even the dishes they had their family dinners, parties, funerals.

I am no longer a practicing Christian as such, but I would like to dedicate this post to her.

God love her.

Wintermoor


This message was edited Thursday, Aug 15th 7:40 PM

I have been watching the news and the destruction being wrought is difficult to imagine. I understand what you mean about the elderly lady, I do hope that she has family to turn to, that their love can make new memories for her. I am glad that your friends are safe. Hoping that countries, including US, can pull together and help rebuild.

Wintermoor, I'm glad I hear from you.
I've been thinking in you and Monika, hoping that the waters stay well away from both of you...

That doesn't mean that I don't feel for all those people , loosing everything .........it's very hard.

*sigh* Yes, God love her and the rest of those poor folk. :(

May God bless that lady's heart and give her strength to endure this horrible thing...

The floods are on the areas we visited in June. We also drove by a bridge crossin Donau in Budapest. And a small bridge in Czech which is for sure under water now. :|