The No Name Diary

Sunday 10th of November

There are times when a you’re left dumbstruck. Last Sunday I sat in front of my computer to write a blog entry here in the city centre, yet the enormity of what happened that week had left all of us sick to our stomachs, staring into nothing. The water came rushing down from the mountains with such force and in such quantities that deep canyon-like riverbeds running through surrounding towns filled and burst their banks with terrifying force and speed. The mayor who had purportedly been alerted to the danger from 7 o’clock in the morning on that fateful day, had then been unavailable from 2 to 6pm in a “meeting” with some female TV personality. Precisely the time when people’s houses were filling with water and cars with their occupants were being washed away. Underground carparks in shopping centres were flooded as people raced helplessly to get to their vehicles and all of this before any of our phones pinged off with the official warnings at around 8pm. The unstoppable wave took everything in its path, and was only contained when it finally hit the city’s new riverbed, the one that had been built to divert the river’s path from the city centre after a previous catastrophic flood in 1957. If that hadn’t been in place, we wouldn’t be here in this surreal unharmed normality, surrounded by total devastation. The people of Valencia have mobilised much faster than the local government and when there are no shovels or Wellington boots left, they invent all sorts of tools from broom and mop handles, then tape up their shoes and legs to go out to work in the affected areas, risking their own lives and in some cases losing them. They’re clearing out all the destroyed possessions and the immense quantities of mud left in the wake of the disaster. Bodies are discovered daily, stagnant water sits in garages and rooms inaccessible until special pumps are fed in. Cars full of provisions go out to affected areas and many of the people now homeless come in; for the buildings they’d once called home are no longer safe to inhabit or simply aren’t there anymore. Story after story, question after question. Yesterday 130,000 people took to the streets to demand the immediate resignation of the mayor and for Valencians the fight goes on; to support those people whose lives have just been turned upside down and shaken out, to salvage what can be salvaged, to rebuild destroyed infrastructure, to try and get some sort of justice. I have little more words tonight, all that’s left is to promise to take more food next week, check in on people and keep an ear out for whatever else we can do. If there’s one thought ringing around my head, it’s how damaging and dangerous complacency can be.