If you haven't heard already, there was a huge fire in Southern California last week. Actually, it's many big wildfires. Burnt many homes, blackened lots of trees, evacuated hundreds of thousands of people. It's quite an experience to live through a disaster, there's a lack of those in singapore, not that I'm complaining. It was a little smokey on Sunday but we thought it was because of fires from LA and didn't think much about it, went to labs, checked my sea urchins, picked my colonies.. Monday morning, my aunt called me and told me UCSD was closed because of fires near San Diego and that she's evacuating. Wow, this thing's serious.

Well, ok, classes cancelled, no midterms. Good. The air stinks. It's much worse than Singapore during the Sumatra fires. much much worse. It's like people burning incense paper everywhere + the indonesian fires. The air smells like smoke, ash particles are everywhere. Our window was opened throughout the night and there was a black layer of soot over everything next to the window. I could see soot particles flying in. It was freaking hot and we couldn't open window. Evacuation orders were being given all day, half a million people were evacuating.. friends were freaking out and packing.. got us a bit worried too. What happens if we were asked to evacuate? I never thought that the fire would ever reach La Jolla, but since Carmel Valley (2 highway exits away) was asked to evacuate, I don't see why the evacuation order wouldn't reach us. Stayed tuned to the news all day. Loved my radio.

And then, Tuesday classes cancelled. Fires were spreading, somehow it crossed the I15. Del Mar had to evacuate, Rancho Bernado was burned.. Air's terrible. It's getting scarier. Then UCSD sent an announcement, classes cancelled all week. Hahaha. After hearing this, many many many people started leaving san diego, going back to LA, flying back to Nor Cal. Guess what I did? I hunted down a ticket to Chicago and flew there. Hahaha. Got holiday, might as well make good use of it right? More about it some other time.

Anyway, a lot of people evacuated to Qualcomm Stadium, which is the main stadium in San Diego, and the aids that were going to that stadium and other evacuation centers were just amazing. Starbucks sent coffee, Costco sent food and water, volunteers donated burgers and sandwiches and offered massages.. Donations were so much that they had to stop accepting. Thanks to all the warm-hearted Californians. People who went to Qualcomm said that it was like a festival there. Kind of like Quidditch world cup, everyone pitching tents, big screen TV, plenty of food and water.. Evacuation in luxury. How many people get coffee and massages while evacuating?

It is San Diego after all, where the rich live. Or at least the middle class. Families with comfortable lives, owning at least 1 car.. When they're asked to evacuate, most just grabbed their important stuff and sped off in their cars. The house is probably covered under extensive insurance. It'll be a lot of inconvenience if houses really burn down, but we'll all live. After all, the money's not going to burn. Furthermore, even though the air's terrible, even though it's pretty hot in the day, at least people were not wet and cold and hungry and miserable. And the later evacuation orders were sent with plenty of time for people to get ready.. People were ready.

You need friends. you need to be prepared for emergencies. You need to not panic.. San Diegans did a pretty good job at all these.