when disaster strikes…

after seeing my cousin off at the airport yesterday i was looking forward to a relatively easy day.

but when i got home and saw the mess in my small kitchen (we left hurriedly right after breakfast), i decided to tidy things up. i was depositing stuff inside the cabinet directly below the kitchen sink when i accidentally hit the pipe with a sturdy metal container. “Yikes!”

in a moment i was having my face thoroughly washed as water gushed out with a vengeance. spluttering, i stared aghast as the sparkling liquid began to fill up the cabinet, before spilling onto the kitchen floor. in a matter of minutes i was ankle-deep in water.

belatedly i sprang into action, stacking things up (clothes, boxes, etc.) in higher places as my benumbed mind kicked into overdrive. i fumbled for my celphone and began calling my landlord. it took me a while to realize that his celphone was turned off, so i tried his landline but no one was answering. i rushed down to his place, with my wet shirt and shorts flapping behind me like a battered sail.

“aaarrrgh! i don’t believe this!” i groaned in frustration when i saw his padlocked door. “of all days, why in heaven’s name did he have to go out today?” i grumbled despairingly as i ran back to my place. by this time the water has already reached my bedroom.

i tried stuffing the leak with a rag and tied it with rubber as a stopgap measure, but it was no use. i could hear my downstairs neighbor complaining distractedly about the onslaught of water in her front door. i was on the verge of calling the plumber when i suddenly remembered that there actually a unit switch in the top floor that i could manipulate to control the water flow.

whoosh… off i flew on the stairs (as if the hounds of hell were pursuing me).

in a few seconds the deluge stopped. after muttering a weary explanation and apology to my neighbors, i stumbled back to my kitchen and stared at the watery mess.

so much for my rest day.

the next hour passed agonizingly slow as i mopped and wiped the water off the floor, then put things back in their proper places. two hours later, my landlord arrived and after laughing heartily at my tale, he changed the busted (and rusty) pipe. being the tolerant fellow that he is (he didn’t even read me the Riot Act or charge me for the new pipe), he just cautioned me about hitting the pipe with metallic objects and left.

stretching my creaking bones, i muttered “my God, i feel as though i’d been put through the wringer twice.”

my garrulous neighbor, who was a bemused witness to my hapless fate, capped it with an apt comment: “well, you sure look like it. earlier you were rushing around like a deranged chicken trying to do the conga. we thought your unit was on fire or something.”

i don’t know if that comment was meant to make me feel better or to insult the chicken, but i was too pooped to care either way. “yeah, whatever. i suppose it could’ve been worse.”