Hello! Noah?

I know I have been talking up all the great weather here in South Africa, right?  Well, I've obviously been bragging a little too much and someone upstairs has decided to take me down a few notches.  Even though it might appear summery here to the casual observer, it's still actually springtime, and in South Africa that means the rainy season.  The last few days have been good and wet.  With midwestern style thunderstorms to go with it.  Night before last we had a whopper of a rainstorm.  The rain came fast and furious and continued for a good few hours after the kids went to bed.  Being used to such weather, Chris and I continued to watch our movie and marveled at how it was finally getting down and dirty (the storm, not us and not the movie).  It felt a lot like home, and since I love a good thunderstorm anyway we eventually went to bed, but not before I noticed the headlights on the road behind our house (and on the other side of our security wall) were stopped and backed up down the road.  Strange, since it's not a very busy road during the evening and that they were all sitting still with their flashers on.  We wondered what was going on, but couldn't really see much in the dark and rain, so just left it.
Come to find out the next morning, the water (or river as I like to call it) in the culvert behind our house and on the other side of the security wall had swept part of the security wall behind our next door neighbors house right into their back garden.  Yes, a two foot thick brick wall, washed away by the rain. The raging river continued to flow through their garden taking out their garden fence in front of their house, the garage, driveway, and first floor of the neighbors' beside them, and the three houses at the end of our block.

The first photo is of our neighbors side garden and the house who had their entire first floor washed right out the glass patio doors into their pool.  The wall of water was strong enough to knock the kitchen cabinets off the walls, and shove everything out the accordion patio doors.  You can see too it took almost all the brick pavers lining their drive and washed them down the block to where you see them dumped in the neighbors drive. 
The second photo is of the last house on the lane. I think them and their neighbors lost a car in the garage along with most of both their driveways and their belongings on the first floors.  There was a flood mark about a foot and a half up their outer wall.  And the poor folks who parked their cars on the lane found them that next morning in the creek behind the house in the second picture, submerged, one on top of the other.
All this because the drain at the end of the culvert behind the estate was mostly blocked by weeds and debris, I think.
Though there was a lot of damage, no one was hurt.
I think I'm thankful today that no one was injured and that we survived unscathed.  If the water had backed up another several feet, it would have taken out our section of wall, and left us underwater too.
Be well everyone.