A Desert Flood

I came into Tata last Tuesday, planning to head out to my village Thursday to leave for our vaccination drive into the mountains, but everything changed. I went by SIAPP to see when the nurses were heading up to my village for the Polio drive, so I could catch a ride. All vaccination drives were cancelled because all vehicles were down in Akka, Liz’ village, an hour south. They wouldn’t be leaving anytime soon due to the mass destruction and chaos the village was in.

I saw it on the Egyptian news. Five villages make up Akka. Liz’ village was one of the worst hit. Her village is set at the base of a mountain. Two riverbeds wind around each side of it. Heavy rains north sent a flood and two four foot walls of water wrapped around each side of the mountain, crashing into each other at the village’s center. There were an estimated 600 houses destroyed, 14 deaths, 1500 dead animals, including 150 drowned camels that are now traveling downstream somewhere. With all of this, we decided to catch a ride to Akka to see what we could do.


Peace Corps called SIAPP last week to check on Liz, to see if her house still stood. It did. She lives on the second floor of one of the few concrete houses. She and her downstairs family stood on the balcony and watched all of the houses around hers fall. When one neighbor asked if their house had fallen, Liz had to turn to them and say yes.


Liz looks tired and drained. Standing on her roof Saturday, I saw what used to be homes, but are now piles of rock and mud. The sound of three motors can be heard over everything, sucking out the pond that sits in the midst of cement blocks, wooden beams, and wet blankets of mud. Frogs have come out of nowhere, and are multiplying as fast as the locusts that swarmed through last month.



It is incomprehensible to me that there could have been that much water, that it could have come through here with such damaging force. I could describe and describe in detail and you still wouldn’t see it. A tornado I can understand. A hurricane I can understand. An earthquake could have done it. But this is the desert! I have only seen rain twice since I’ve been south. It makes no sense that a flood rush of fast water could bolt through this village and do this much damage in a matter of an hour.


People are worried about some kind of epidemic breaking out, like cholera. The fifteenth death was found yesterday, a young girl buried under the rubbage. It’s chaotic down here. Few people know how to handle this. Men are trying to get the dead animals out, taken away, and buried. Men in business suits get out of the many trucks and cars that have come. They pile in and out estimating damage. Bulldozers are on their way to start clearing out this mess.



And over against the side of buildings, or under the shade, are the many village men sitting on their asses, doing absolutely nothing. I want to run up to them, kick them off their ass, to start helping out. The fatalistic attitude of some Moroccans drives me crazy. God meant for it to happen, so they're drinking their mint tea waiting for God to clean up.