Today we had a really intense typhoon, 颱風, that hit most of northeastern Taiwan. We have had a few typhoons this season that have caused Taipei to cancel all work and school, but none as strong as this one. I woke up this morning to the sound of the tiles on our roof rattling in the wind. Work was canceled so I was looking forward to a day of reading, music, and movies. I was doing just that when my roof fell in.

I really like how dramatic it sounds, but it wasn't very serious. A very strong gust of wind seemed to push down the bottom section of the roof. We have been having problems with the roof lately anyway, leaks and what not.

So, I called my kindly neighbor Ebbe to help. We were able to nail it back in place, but then another gust sent it falling down again. So, we gave up and now I have a gaping hole in my bedroom ceiling. I am lucky that it is purely aesthetic.

Then I was trying to secure my tree when I notice that the roof drainage pipe had come lose and water was pouring all over the porch which shouldn't really be a problem because rain was coming from all directions except I was worried about flooding on our porch. So, I spent a few minutes in the thick of things trying to fix that stubborn pipe.

What you can't really tell by the picture is that the wind is blowing so hard that it is somewhat difficult and scary to stand up, not to mention that the rain is cold and pelting me and the water from the drainage pipe is dousing me. I walked away from that extremely wet and cold.

We then started to dry off and open some beers when we heard a loud crash. We rush out onto the porch to discover that our tree had fallen over and some of its smaller branches had broken off.

So, I guess I didn't do a very good job securing it. Poor tree has seen its fair share of abuse; James and I are pretty protective of it. So, when I called him in Tainan 台南 to tell him what happened he seem worried.

After all this excitement I started to get a headache. A combination cold, hunger, & tired headache. So, I laid down to read and fell asleep. Only to be awaken shortly after by a loud crash. Apparently part of the metal divider between our porch and the neighbor's porch was riped from its bolts and crashed to the ground below. There are also scraps of it strewn around the porch, along with the shelf that was sitting in front of it. The picture below shows it still intact, just shortly before its savage removal.

Now I am blessed with the constant sound of the remaining metal banging against the neighbor's caged porch. Music to my weary ears.

All in all this has been a pretty exciting 颱風. I feel pretty grateful that all of the damage has been exclusively superficial. I don't like to imagine what it would have been like to really encounter damage to my house or to completely lose my house.

I would really like to thank my neighbors for helping me and taking pictures of everything. This has really made up for the previous two 颱風。Tomorrow I have a lot of cleaning ahead of me, especially since we are trying to get someone nice to live here after we leave next month.