like i said, September 26 for me and Mia was a different story. since our company decided to push through with the Family Day though it was raining (not as bad), i still decided to go. Mia was even dressed up for the occassion already!
i asked my brother to come with me (because i needed an extra pair of hands to hold on to mia while driving) but he preferred to stay home. what a blessing that turned out to be. so we picked up another officemate and went on our way.
Imelda Avenue in Cainta was already flooded halfway (around the area of Makro Cainta), probably half of the tires were submerged. Rexi (the camera) unfortunately wasn’t able to take photos because i was too busy navigating following a truck. 
by midday after getting to Club Manila East in Taytay, the rain was already pounding hard. we were all confident that since the resort was a bit elevated, there wouldn’t be any problem with the water. the show went on.
that's the whole company (of 25), with family and minus a few who couldn't make it
lo and behold in about an hour or two, the muddy water was already thigh-deep out on the street and was beginning to flood the parking area. fortunately it didn’t rise any further but that meant we were all stranded inside CME. i already planned to go home right after lunch but the idea if submerging my car with me and Mia inside didn’t really sit well with me.
in the meantime, my mom has already been texting me not to come home anymore because there were flash floods. particularly on our street, which is sloping down towards a dead end, the water has been coming down faster than expected. my 2 brothers thankfully were aware enough to start bringing some appliances upstairs when the water started to come into our garage. the garage was thankfully empty. my mom had our other car with her in Cubao.
when the water started to come into our living room, my brothers started to bring some furniture up onto the higher level of the kitchen. (that turned out to be futile later on). they also thought about bringing in the 3 washing machines but unless you were Superman had a crane to do that, good luck with that.
by the time my dad came home, the water had rushed into the house waist deep in the kitchen and the ref was managed to be transferred upstairs. all the rest of the furniture were unfortunately left.
to make the long story short, my mom had been able to go home in the evening since the water had subsided by then. the cleaning that had to be done was unbelievable. and my mom being the cleanfreak that she is, had shifted to high-gear OC. i can imagine how that was.
i, on the other hand, had been worrying about Mia’s milk and diapers (i had only brought enough for one day) since we had to stay overnight. but God provides, that much i had been assured. one of the resort’s personnel and our HR manager braved the floodwaters and managed to get to SM Taytay. (thank you, thank you!)
by Sunday afternoon,we still weren’t sure if we’d be able to go home because the waters outside and in some areas where we planned to pass were still too high. but the sun shone, a la Noah’s Ark and a dove came bearing an olive branch. 
so Mia went swimming! (forgot to download the photos)
we were finally able to go home when we got news that we could take the Valley Golf-Masinag hiway route. the mess (an understatement) that is Marikina was disheartening. even more so when i realized later that a lot of people washed up on the river banks died.
to say that we were blessed and that my family was spared isn’t even the point. there were so many others who weren’t and who still need help.
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pictures of how Ondoy damaged the house here
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