Phew.... Last year December sure was an interesting month. My roof was on Fire. Literally. And it was on my lil bro's B-day too. lol. 3 huge fire trucks came into our Garden looking for the house which all the neighbours had reported was smoking from the roof... And since a Datin (which is the Malaysian equivalent for Lady) called the fire department, it seemed that the entire fire department came to the 'Rescue'. Almost 30 people. @.@

My bro was out with his frens for his surprise party for his 18th b-day which my mom and I threw for him and we secretly called his friends to meet in TGI Friday's then brought him along. I tell ya. If it was me who was being surprised, it would probably be like "Oh my God! What are you doing here? Oh wow. Thank you so much, you guys" to my friends. All he did was 'Oh hello.' And his friends 'Hi.' That's it.

..... Boys!

So my mom and I stuck around in the restaurant for a while, had lunch with them then left them to go play and cyber cafe and stuff. Then, we came back home.

On the way home, it Poured. Anyone who's been in Monsoon countries during the Rainy Season would probably know what I mean by 'pouring rain'. I swear it was like a waterfall from the sky. With really scary lightning and thunder and all. I usually Love watching it rain but that day was horrible.

Got home in one piece even though we could not see 2 feet in front of us even while driving with the wipers at hyper speed and the lights on. Then while my mom was wrestling with the auto gate cause the power in our house had tripped, some of our neighbours crowded around my car and tried talking to me. Impossible to hear what they were saying even when they were shouting in my ears. So they went back to their house, I drove the car into my porch and they called our phone and told us about the smoke and fire they saw coming out from our roof.

We went to check but could not see any fire. I could smell an electrical burn though (accident in my electrical systems lab in middle school and there was a mini electrical fire so I kinda know what that smells like, that's all I'm saying bout that =p). So we packed up the essentials and waited by the front door cause it was still pouring outside and called my dad.

Know what my dad said? "Ok. Wait in the house. Lock the door. And don't let Anyone in. I'm coming home" ^^;;;

boy, he's lucky that there was no actual big fire at that time... We would have been fried if we listened to those Stupid instructions. Aih.

So, right after we put down the phone, the fire engines finally found our house. Again, anyone who has been in Malaysia looking for house addresses could tell you that it is practically a given that you will never find the street you are looking for. Ex. If looking for street 19 and one is driving along the road, Street 16, 17, 18, 20, 21... Street 19 would be in Another garden altogether. ^^

Ah ha. Again, So lucky the roof fire wasnt a big one, we would have been fried too by the time the fire engine arrived. Yeah there was an actual fire up there. We found that out when my dad came back a few minutes after the trucks came and we were standing outside under the porch telling them "No no. It's ok. No fire here. You can all go home. Thanks for coming" =p

Dad arrived while they were still looking at my mom and me blankly. Poor people. We must have been the only calm ones about this fire in the whole area cause our neighbours later told us that they had all phoned the fire department to let them know about this fire and the thick belching smoke coming out of the roof and stuff. lol. It was Our house that was on fire and we were the only ones not panicking about it.

So the Fireman Captain told my dad that he Had to do a check of the area because it was procedure. (and probably because of all our kind , highly anxious, Titled nighbours making the calls) Dad brought them up to the roof and it was then that we found out that the thing that had burned was the aluminium sheet that's put between the roof tiles and the inside house roof to keep out the sun and dripping rain that had all burned up. That sheet was supposed to be fire-proof too. Damn dangerous.

There were smouldering sections of the ashes and my dad had to go modify a few water bottles into mini water pistols (Smart Dad.) to squirt at all the smoking corners of our inside roof cause those firemen did Not have Any Fire Extinguishers with them. I mean. WTH?!? They're Firemen! They're Supposed to have fire extinguishers. Urgh!...

Then, they had the Gall to blame Us for the fire saying that it was because of the lights my dad had set up in the roof which caused a short circuit. Luckily dad had the foresight to call our electrician, who was the person who does everything concerning the electrical stuff in our house, in as soon as I told him on the phone that I it was probably an electrical fire.

When the electrician came, he confirmed that it was lightning that caused the fire. They actually Asked for Proof! Couldnt they see the Huge Gaping Hole in our roof tiles where that lightning strike had totally shattered the tiles? !

So the whole thing took about 2 and a half hours and they Finally agreed that it was caused by lightning and Not my dad's fault and they left. My dad was the one who did all the hard work. Of all the almost 30 people who came 20 over sat in their trucks and only 3 actually came in to check everything out. They even called my dad to go up to the roof with them and because it was so dark, my dad hit his head really hard on one of the protruding beams as he did not have a helmet all the firemen were wearing. ! His head was actually bleeding and all.

Well, after they left, our electrician managed to get the downstairs lights and water pump working and the upstairs aircons running cause all the wires were completely fried. Miracle worker. We were debating if the family wanted to go stay in a hotel for a day or 2 but decided not to.

The next day, dad called in our contractor and electricians and had them try to fix everything. Yesterday, they finished. Ah~~ I can sleep til after 9am again finally cause they had to fix the roof and all the wires which were also located up there and it was really noisy. Since this was messy work and we had all these people at the house, we also had them repaint the house, changed our outside tiles and do a bit of modifications and cosmetic surgery to the house too. ^_^.

I am in Love with how the house looks like now. Love. ^_^. Also, really hungry everytime I look at the paint cause the colours are called creme brulee and rocky road. My fav dessert and ice cream flavour. lmao.

And yays for not having to look up Paranoiedly everytime I need to use the bathroom or change cause there were several holes in my plaster ceiling from all the roof tiles falling on it and the workers were in the roof fixing them *shudders* Exhibitionist I am so not.

We also found out a bit later that that Lightning Strike that hit our roof was a pretty busy little lightning. A really viscious one too. It hit a lot of houses in a straight line. The house opposite mine had all their lights blown up and the surrounding ceiling had black soot marks. The one behind them had a huge hole from the roof right through to their ceiling the size of a sedan car and the rain had flooded their whole house. The house behind us had several sections of their roof tiles missing and the one opposite them was probably the worst of the lot. That lightning shattered their front glass doors, hit a hole in the wall behind the galss doors and struck the maid who was behind that wall on her left shoulder. She had to be rushed to the hospital. She's ok now. Laughing about the little charred section on her shoulder too. Funny person.

All in all, I think our house came out quite alright considering the other house's conditions. Barring the house with the maid and us, the owners of the other houses were away on vacation and were totally shocked when they came back to find the condition their poor homes were in.