Harvey was devastating to the city of Houston, but we are a resilient people, and out of the torrential, never-ending downpour birthed countless stories of heroism and sacrifice. I have always been proud to throw up the "H," but that fateful week in August was peak H-Town.
But somehow or other, it has gotten back to me from various
people that my role in the “rescues” has been grossly exaggerated. Like, worse than how badly the folks on
Storage Wars overestimate how much they can sell their cobwebbed junk for. No, I did not backstroke from my own flooded
house with my wife and 1-year-old in tow.
Our house was under mandatory evacuation, so we spent a
rushed hour moving a lot of our stuff to the second story before loading up
the Honda Fit to head over to my parents’ house. The three of us huddled into the car, bowed for a
quick prayer, turned the key… and nothing.
The battery was dead.
The timing was not ideal, with the water on the roads rising by the minute, and by the time we transferred everything and everyone to the other car, the water was over the curb and creeping onto the sidewalk. Luckily I was able to maneuver around the new lake by cutting across my front lawn, and I thought I was so slick until we got to Sienna Parkway and grasped that my car was way too low to pass. Defeated, we retraced our steps, sliding across the front lawn and back into the garage.
Enter Omar. His giant truck showed up on our driveway to take us to the promised land. With my family safe and Omar willing and ready to continue helping out, I started asking around via text and tweets to see if anybody was stuck at their house. Over the next few hours, we assisted a couple of church families with escaping from neighborhoods with knee-deep water on the pavement. That’s when we started hearing about one particular flooded subdivision in Riverstone.
Omar and I showed up at the scene at about 10 PM, with two church families in mind to pick up. We had two addresses in hand and were getting more via the magic of the internet. My phone had died, so I was signed in to Twitter on Google Chrome on Omar’s phone inside of a Ziploc bag. It was still raining hard. The water was more than halfway up the stop sign poles. There were all kinds of first responders there, including volunteers, police officers, and the fire department. We told a handful of officers about the addresses we had, and they only had room for one of us on their boat, so Omar went with them while I hurried back to his truck for warmth. I was soaked and shivering and regretting ever making fun of one of my friends for being a hoarder and keeping random items like a wetsuit in his garage.
Omar returned about half an hour later, explaining that they only had a chance to go to one of the addresses. By this time, I had acquired another church friend’s address as well as countless others from strangers. Omar and I clearly needed a boat to be of any use at all, so we started looking for one.
Somewhat miraculously, we found one lying on the side of the road. The motor was busted, but at least it floated. We requested permission to borrow it from two officers in the vicinity, but nobody seemed to even know who it belonged to, and one of them shrugged and told us to just return it after we were done.
This is the part of the story where I clearly delineate our character roles. To put it into board game context, I was the dispatcher in Pandemic, trying to figure out who needed to be moved where and when. Omar was the tank piece in Monopoly, doing unbelievable tank things. Wait, there’s a tank piece in Monopoly, right? If not, that entire metaphor falls apart. Okay, back to the story.
We pushed the boat to the entrance of the neighborhood, and since there weren’t any oars or paddles, I was thinking we could wade alongside the boat or I could kick from behind like Dash in The Incredibles. But Omar had other ideas.
"Get in," he said simply.
So I hopped into the 3.5-seater and watched as the Beast from the Middle East threw the rope attached to the front of the boat over his shoulder, tied it around his midsection... and just. Started. Walking.
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| Thanks to Cynthia Hua for the quick picture! |
I had transformed from a dispatcher to a human GPS, and I sat there using my best robot voice for directions as Omar dragged me and the boat in cold, chest-deep water. This wasn't a short adventure -- we had two houses to get to, and the further one was more than half a mile from the subdivision entrance.
I wish the rain let up for a single fleeting moment so I could sneak a picture in. But Omar kept on trekking, and you couldn't hear anything except for the raindrops falling on the rising water around us and the motors of the other boats.
One of the officers driving another boat stopped us. We were in a boat going way below speed limit in the midst of a hurricane, and we still got pulled over by the cops. Things got unnecessarily tense:
Officer: "Where did y'all get that boat?"
Us: "It was on the side of the road."
Officer: "That's the property of the Fire Department. You shouldn't be out here anyway. Turn around and put it back where you got it. You're lucky we don't have you arrested."
Us: "Well, we asked one of the officers there if we could borrow it."
Officer: "Did you? What was his name?"
Us: "Uhh... I don't remember. But we have two families at two addresses who need help, and we'll return the boat after that."
Officer: "You have two addresses? Okay, fine. But you can't fit more than 3 other people on that boat. So lead these officers to one of the addresses and then return the boat immediately."
So Omar resumed his Strongman competition, except now we had a larger boat with three officers in it chugging along slowly behind us. We passed by submerged cars and SUVs, making sure to avoid trees and fire hydrants as the caravan made its way towards the first address. When we finally arrived, we stepped inside to lend four hands with moving luggage and/or kids, and the water was almost two feet deep on the hardwood floors. Water damage is awful. We quickly escorted the family of six into the bigger boat, and I squeezed back into the water rickshaw to navigate to the second address.
After a number of twists and turns in the dark night, we reached the second house. The water level was about two feet away from the base of the garage, and we loaded the family of three into our bobbing vessel. The mother was confused as to where Omar was going to sit. I didn't say anything so I could fully enjoy the moment all their jaws dropped when they realized that Omar was about to singlehandedly haul the four of us out of the neighborhood.
It was a bit painful leaving. The family was understandably worried about their home, and we passed up dozens of their neighbors appealing for aid from their front doors. Our boat was probably past full capacity already, so we could only assure them that the Fire Department was on site and would be coming back soon to rescue more people. But that must have been a sight to behold for them -- watching a hulk of a man ford a river while pulling a boat with four passengers in the middle of their street. I hope they had popcorn ready -- that's superhero work.
Now we're coming up on the one-year anniversary of the natural disaster, and while the city is still recovering, I am honored to have witnessed the feats of incredible people like Omar who gave credence to the #HoustonStrong hashtag.
And that, my friends, is the (short) true story of how Omar dominated Hurricane Harvey.
Now I finally know the full story. Loved this.
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