We have been to Salaya this morning to move the little girl’s possessions from her previous dorm room to her new one – just one hundred metres away or thereabouts but in a largely unaffected area. Although her room had been on the first floor, the whole of the house is pretty much ruined.
The water level is very evident – waist high for me and rather higher for the womenfolk. The amount of mud and other matter in the water can be imagined from the dirtiness of the marks everywhere. The remnants of the mud and various bits of detritus are still hanging around everywhere.
The photos do not, of course, convey the smell or the amount of dust in the air, both of which are significant and detrimental to health, presumably. Pretty much everything inside the house which was touched by the water was ruined and is being thrown out. On the way out there, we saw many piles of rubbish which were household goods (or garden goods) which had been affected and discarded by people. Then again, it is an ill wind and so forth, and there are a number of water pickers (a better word than scavengers, I have decided) who are looking through the piles of rubbish for items that can be cleaned, rescued and either used or perhaps sold.
Along the front road facing Mahidol University in particular, the business owners are starting to open up – some are still clearing out the mud, some are pouring new layers of concrete over frontages (the water has opened up many potholes) and life is at least offering to return to normal. Good luck to them all, there is not much in the way of insurance for this.
The road back from Salaya to central Bangkok is passable now, although there are a few patches of water. The deepest is at the corner from the university road on to the expressway, where the water comes up perhaps half a metre on the left hand side of the road and we went into a concealed pothole – but non-small cars and motor bikes can make it through without serious problems if using care.