Recently, my home went through the longest unexpected water supply disruption in my life.
On May 20 Tuesday night, the water pressure of my home saw a noticeable drop, enough that my shower's water heater would not heat up the water, so I ended up taking a cold shower.
Then on May 21 Wednesday morning, my home's water supply was cut off without warning. We already planned to do the laundry on Wednesday, so the water cut meant we could not do it. Fortunately, my father and I were still able to visit a public dental clinic for teeth scaling that day.
In the evening, we learned that many areas of my city were also affected by the unscheduled water supply disruption, caused by an unexpected breakdown of the main pumps that channel water to our area's water treatment plant. According to a media statement, the repair was expected to be completed on the next morning.
However, throughout May 22 Thursday, my home's water supply was still not restored, so did many other people in my city. This officially marked the longest water cut I have ever experienced in my life — while this was far from the first time I experienced unscheduled water cut, in previous times, the water supply took at most a day to restore. Apparently the repair at the water treatment plant took longer than expected. At night, official statement stated that the repair had been completed, and water supply was expected to be restored on May 23 Friday morning. Some of my relatives who lives in the same city started to get water back.
After the water cut, my parents' bathroom ran on water reserves from reservoir tanks, so I needed to borrow my parents' bathroom, as I was no longer able to use the water in my bathroom. Lack of water means we could not cook, which meant no meal cooked, no boiled eggs for breakfast and no coffee brewed at home. In the face of uncertainties about when will our water supply be restored, we also bought large bottles of mineral water that we could drink in case we ran out of drinking water before our water supply was restored.
As if the disruption to our daily routing caused by the unexpected water cut was not enough, on Thursday I also started to get runny nose, likely due to allergy. I took half of a runny nose medicine tablet before going to sleep.
Came May 23 Friday morning, my home still did not get water back, and we started to get anxious, especially since our water reserve was also running out. We could not wait to let days of unclean clothes piled up for any longer, so we had to bring our clothes to a laundry shop and wash our clothes there. The last time I visited a laundry shop was during my university school years when I stayed in a condominium that served as our student hostel. While waiting for our clothes to finish washing, we had lunch at a mixed rice restaurant that provided free drinking water.
After going back home and hang our washed clothes outside our house, I took another whole tablet of runny nose medicine instead of just half, and had a nap to let my nose recover. When I was napping, my home's water supply finally began to come back, enough for my father to brew coffee again. Therefore, I decided to take the opportunity to enjoy coffee at home again to celebrate the return of our water supply, and my nose recovering. My home's water pressure was still yet to return to normal, but at least it was enough for us to cook again, and to have a proper shower and wash our hair.
As of today, on May 24 Saturday morning, the water pressure of my home returned to normal at long last.
Unexpected water supply disruption already causes inconvenience even if it lasts only a day, but one that lasts more than a day is even worse, and absolutely not an experience I want to relive ever again.
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