This Tuesday marks three weeks of the biggest natural disaster that Spain has suffered in recent decades. DANA, which claimed more than 216 lives in the province of Valencia, continues to affect the municipalities it devastated. Cars piled up in the middle of the street, mud that makes some areas of the municipality impassable or people walking kilometers and kilometers to go to work, due to the lack of means of transportation, are the incidents in their daily life that most remind residents of the passing of the DANA for its people.
In Paiporta and Picaña, ground zero of the destruction, is where the damage is even more visible. Where normal life will take longer to recover. In fact, explains a neighbor, “We will never be the same again”. Paiporta, with 45 deaths, is the municipality that lost the most citizens. Also the fact that three weeks after the catastrophe its streets still look nothing like what they were just a month ago. There are few passersby, beyond those who walk to work or come to help as volunteers. There are hardly any cars either, apart from the police patrols from different cities in Spain that provide assistance, in a silent city that silently mourns its victims.
In a restaurant in the town they work overtime to reopen as soon as possible. It is run by a family of Chinese origin, established in Paiporta for years, who tried to save their lives by hanging on to the father, mother and 13-year-old daughter from a lamppost. The parents managed to support themselves, but the force of the water took away Hoo. For three days her parents shouted her name through the streets of the neighborhood in the hope of finding her alive. The fourth time they learned the fatal outcome. After grieving, and with the aim of seeking a distraction from an irreparable loss, they look for a way out of their sadness by trying to recover their business. “If they are already raising their heads the day after burying their 13-year-old daughter, what are we not going to do, since we have only suffered material losses,” says another neighbor.
How the water managed to reach the doors of their houses, the payment of aid and whether they will have to pay taxes for the donations, who is responsible for not having sent the notice to the population before or on identity exchange of well-known people who have died, are some of the topics of conversation that continue to occupy the few tables in the cafeterias that have already been able to reopen their doors in Alfafar. Everyone is very cautious in conversations.
Going dressed in mourning is an omen that, for an acquaintance you meet, the consequences have been lethal. “Yesterday I buried my wife and four-year-old daughter.”snapped a reputable businessman when questioned about how he was by someone he often crossed paths with. In the Catarroja cemetery, this Tuesday, the funeral of one of the last victims who could be identified was held. Sober. With part of the graves also affected by the devastation.
Business reopening
But this third week after DANA, thanks to I work night and day To recover their businesses, many small business owners are also looking with hope at the possibility of reopening their stores later this week. In Paiporta or Picanya there are still none open. Nor any supermarket. Neighbors fill their pantries thanks to the distribution of meals that NGOs and volunteers continue to do. Hot food also continues to be distributed daily, for those who still do not have gas or electricity in their homes, 21 days later.
In Alfafar, one of the three photography stores there, Kike’s, will reopen its doors this coming Friday. “I forgot to make the transfer through the photo booth,” he told his partner, sitting at the table of a bar where they had gone for lunch, while celebrating that on Wednesday he would have the machine installed to take ID photos. Something that may seem the least important in a tragedy like the one experienced. But it is transcendental for the renewal of DNI and driving licenses that many have lost with the passage of water. The police have opened mobile renewal pointsbut there is no place to take the necessary photo.
Kike has been able to accelerate the reopening of his small business, which was completely flooded, thanks to the work of dozens of volunteers “who came to ask if you needed help, since it is difficult for us to ask for it,” he acknowledges, and “they got to work 10 to 14 without saying a word”. In conversation with Vozpópuli he says that he doesn’t even know the name of most of them. “I did ask someone who came with a group for their Instagram and I found it,” he explains excitedly. Large companies in its sector, such as Sony, Kodak or Profoto, have cameras and material transferred for one year from other countries so you can restart. Also professional colleagues from other places like the Balearic Islands.
anonymous help
These days, with the urgency already overcome, some anonymous heroes also emerge who have helped the most urgent material reach the most affected towns when there were no wellies, shovels or any other product necessary to bail out the water and remove the mud. . It is the case of Alberto Aibara 35-year-old businessman from Benetússer who was in Madrid on the day the tragedy occurred. After her mother called, telling her that she was alone at home, that her father and brother were unreachable, she did not think twice about returning to her town.
Aibar, what made his car available of some Valencians who spend part of the week in Madrid for work, at a time when neither trains nor planes were running, contacted one of the Decathlon stores in Madrid to ask for help. And he took with him several wellies that helped the neighbors and volunteers work on the ground the first days. Through his social networks he thanked the company for its collaboration, which he later channeled through him, who contacted the town councils or the Civil Guard of Paiporta to find out their needs, sending more products. Nespresso or Ferrovial did the same.
The young businessman, in addition, despite the fact that his business only started a few years ago, sent an email to all his workers to inform them that they were going to be enter an extra payment of 2,000 euros to help alleviate the losses they have suffered. This Tuesday he left his office for a few hours to put on his wellies again and go see his neighbors to see if they needed anything.
Source: www.vozpopuli.com
