Published: 4 March 2022
Last updated: 4 March 2024
SHARON OFFENBERGER: Rather than being glued to ‘special coverage’ on Israeli media, I am now glued to the local ‘flood cam’, for updates on my third flood within a year
WHEN WE LIVED in Jaffa, I learned very quickly the difference between the sound of fireworks and the sound of gunshots. Both would ring out from time to time, fireworks for weddings, gun shots for revenge.
In regional NSW I am learning the difference between regular rains and flood rains, regular floods and REAL floods. Like knowing the difference between a limited two-day barrage of rockets and outright war, you develop a sense.
Rather than being glued to panels of “special news coverage” on Israeli media channels, I am now glued to the local “flood cam” watching the river and home insurance premiums rising by the minute.
With the kids off from school, I show them on a map of Ukraine where their grandfather was born. We switch between looking at photos of Ukrainians fleeing with their pets, only to end up looking at news coverage of people in Lismore doing the same.
Living in a flood zone can feel like living in a war zone.
This is already my third flood in Bellingen, so I am seasoned. But I have also only lived here for a year – three floods is a bit tiring. At least the wars in Israel were spread out.
Like in a war zone, WhatsApp and Facebook groups in regional communities are the fastest and most reliable sources of information about which roads are impassable, who might need help and where the power is out.
Further north, they have been harder hit and I read pleas from people stranded on their roofs, neighbours calling for help, people offering dry beds to sleep in. The SES, like the IDF, become national heroes. Someone is crowdsourcing warm food for them, as well as clothes and blankets for evacuees because people band together here in a crisis. Here in regional Australia, not just Israel.
While I haven’t found proper figures, I estimate there are thousands of Jewish and Israeli families living in small and not-so-so small towns from Port Macquarie to Tweed Heads. I check in with my friends and family living in the Byron (Northern Rivers) region – “we are flooded in but dry” my cousin texts me back. I don’t hear back from my friend whose property backs onto a bubbling creek in Mullumbimby. I know the answer. We have a bubbling creek near our house in Bellingen which is now a raging river.
In the stunning but sleepy mid-north coast of NSW, my kids have been evacuated from school three times in one year and are enjoying yet another learning-free day under warm blankets in what is supposed to be summer. In Israel, their school was cancelled maybe once or twice throughout their childhood, only for a specific security alert, not just a regular war day.
Mould instead of militant groups become my enemy and even though we call a temporary ceasefire as I wipe down furniture and light the fireplace to dry out the house a little, I know the mould will probably surprise me like Hamas tunnels.
Flooding is serious business to the many who live outside town limits, access roads cut off along with the electricity. Not to mention those who tend livestock and animals. What happens to all the cows, I wonder? Returning to ruined houses, swept-away cars is devastating, and recovery takes months.
A regular road in regional Australia can be the main thoroughfare for surrounding towns and it is common for a landslide to block that road for weeks, if not months. Repairs take much longer out in regional Australia. The potholes that have opened along the main arteries could swallow a small car.
REAL floods are heartbreaking.
But regular floods, are … well… exciting. When not in imminent danger, the locals flock to see the rising river in bare feet and raincoats. The first thing one learns out here is to get your kicks from nature rather than nightlife.
“Why doesn’t the council build a proper bridge?” a self-proclaimed visitor posted last week in one of the regional groups. A barrage ensues about the beauty of flood days and the character of a town that is intermittently cut in two by a submerged bridge. Camaraderie and community spirit fills the comments section.
Our town was spared this week. Our northern neighbours in Bundjalung Country were not so lucky.
As I write, the rain starts to ease and my one millionth check of line river levels shows a smoothing off, our version of flattening the curve. I haven’t read so many graphs since high school. An email informs me that school is closed again tomorrow.
And then a text IN CAPITALS: EVACUATION ORDER FOR EAST BELLINGEN.
Sorry. Have to go and check in the WhatsApp and Facebook groups whether I live in East Bellingen. I’ve only been here for a year.
