Ken, One Year On

Remember Ken?

His home went under in the floods.. up to the windows on the second floor.

He lost all his possessions... salvaged a few.

Well, Ken is in good spirits these days.

He has a new front door, thanks to the Body Corporate.

Still no floors downstairs.

.. and that hot water system we got connected for him is motoring along fine.

He has little piles of flood damaged stuff everywhere... that he is "working on".

January 2010. 

The flood waters got up to where the walls are missing.... on the second floor.

Flood mud in the wall cavities as you can see.

January 2012.

Ken's got a new kitchen, complete with walls.... and artwork.

Still needs to move the fridge upstairs from near the front door!

No rush.

Flood mud.

Ken chose plush ruby red carpet for the stairs and the living room upstairs.

Oh how he loves his red carpet!

There are lovely new tiles on the floor in the second bedroom..

which Ken uses as a dining room, so he doesn't spill food on his beautiful new carpet.

Progress throughout the year.

Flood line on the second floor

Ken got all these groovy new gadgets from Lifeline ...which have all been mounted high up on the wall...  almost above the flood line. The water got up to approx the level of the second shelf....this is on the second floor.

Ken's very proud of his new organising system. 

I spy a couple of salvaged photos :)

There are still reminders...

My little one was very quiet during the tour. He was really spooked by the flood....still asks me if it will flood when the river is high, as it washes over the footpath in front of our place at real high tide.

He perked up when Ken started discussing stick insects.

Still a bit to do... downstairs, non living spaces have not been touched... but they are free of mud and have walls! Ken is in good spirits and is enjoying his new things. He has tried to wash the mud off his CD collection... "but they don't work".

He says that his home is "much better than it was before". 

It's been a long year for Ken.