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wMy Adventures in ... |
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This blog started when I came to Ukraine to do an internship in September 2002. It is a collection of notes on the time I spend in Ukraine. Now, after I have left Kyiv, I am writing stories of my other adventures.
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wFriday, August 15, 2003 |
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Blackout in Toronto
As you all know by now, yesterday, August 14, 2003. Toronto, New York, Detroit, and many other cities had a complete blackout. We lost power. As all lights and computers at work went off, I walked home amongst thousands of walking people. It was complete and utter chaos. Subways and streetcars had stopped; cars were running out of gas and being abandoned on the shoulders of highways. As the traffic lights went off the intersections were manned by the Good Samaritans trying to ease the gridlock by directing the traffic.
All stores were closed except some corner stores whose South Asian owners did not see anything wrong in doing cash business under the candlelight. They were doing a brisk business on water, candles, flashlights, and portable radios. Rabba Grocery stores true to their 24/7 notices remained open on the same cash-only basis. Every Rabba store near my house posted an employee to direct the line up of hundreds of people trying to buy water and dried foods. The scene was unpleasantly reminiscent of earlier perestroika years when sudden money exchanges and inflation threw thousands of people to stock up on anything with long shelf life.
Many people I know already have water and power, but my apartment does not. Since yesterday afternoon we are sitting without either unable to flash the toilet or to make a cup of tea. There is no news or anything to do. I came to work in spite of the Declared Provincial Emergency. My office has power and water, which at the very least means that I can make my tea, wash my hands, and read the news. Though in reality I came to work simply because I having to access to information I had no idea that there is an emergency.
Reaching home I was relieved to find that one elevator remained powered by the emergency generator; hence, I don’t need to walk up to my 37th floor. I also found that we have no candles or bottled water or any food. During the Y2K period I used to stockpile all sorts of emergency supplies under the quiet chuckles on my loving husband. Due to our multiple location changes there is nothing left from my emergency supplies at exactly the time we needed it. Who knew? Remembering the huge line of people trying to get to the nearby Rabba we run to stock up. Surprisingly the shopping went in an orderly fashion.
On a negative note we realized that another thing we did not have among our emergency supplies is emergency cash. We found that we have US dollars, British pounds, Indian rupees, Thai baht, Ukrainians grivnas, and lots of other types of money, but no Canadian dollars. As we both belong to a group of people who believe in plastic, neither of us normally has any cash in hand. You can always take cash from a cash machine if you need it providing, of course, if there is power. Who would have guessed that cash dispensers require power to operate? Apparently, not I. As a result of inability to predict province-wide blackout, we were left with 40 dollars of cash for two of us. ‘Survival supply’ shopping left us with half of it.
Fortunately, the pizza place next door felt that there is a business to be made and continued to take credit cards and make pizza. We took full advantage of this situation.
The streets were full of people. I have never seen so many people just walking on the streets, sitting on the open patios listening to the radios and swapping the rumours. The downtown looked more alive than I have ever seen it. The overall mood was rather festive as people prowled the streets in search of hot food and water. With nothing to do in their houses and with no air-conditioning working, people we looking for reassurance and comfort with each other.
Coming back home, we bought a huge candle with picture of a St. Joseph. Under its deem light we went to sleep hoping that it all would be back to normal tomorrow. It was not. Morning there was still no water (and still there is none) or power. Splashing my face with water from the bottle, I can only think why there is a surprise that there are riots in Basra? They’ve been sitting without water and power for a month. If I don’t get water by next week, there will be a riot here too.
posted by
Lidia at 9:41 AM
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