Nieves Lara
Roxanne Dewey
ENG 101
September 29, 2022
Hurricane Maria
They year 2017 was when my parents decided to move to Puerto Rico for a better future
for us. It was a big thing for my family and I because we never had change like that in our lives.
My parents had ideas for us in Puerto Rico, and that was opening our own ice cream shop. After
a couple of months living there, we finally got comfortable with the new environment. Then a
natural disaster hit, the time I spent stuck in Hurricane Maria made me realize I should value my
life more and to be more grateful that my family had it easy with the after affect.
We moved to Puerto Rico around June, once we arrived, and it was hard at first since I
had no friends and barely knew my family members that lived there. My sister and I were put in
school and my parents bought a car then, they started looking for a house so we can have our
own place to live in. Then the first Hurricane hit, Irma but it didn’t reach Yauco, and it only hit
in San Juan, but it didn’t leave any serious damage. After hurricane Irma hit, everything went
back to normal. After a couple of days when Hurricane Irma hit, we were alerted that a
Hurricane Maria was forming and going to arrive in Puerto Rico, which was also a category five
hurricane.
After we heard the news that Hurricane Maria was going to hit, we went to a grocery
store to stock up on foods and necessities, we had to buy a huge ice cooler to store drinks and
cold foods and bought board games since we knew we’d be stuck in the house for a while. We
barricaded my grandmas’ windows so the disaster wouldn’t do any damage to it, stores also got
barricaded and shut down, the city also turned the power off since the electricity in Puerto Rico
wasn’t that great. I remember laying on a couch sleeping, and I heard the hard rain hitting against
the house and the loud wind, that’s when I knew the hurricane arrived and I remember feeling
scared since I never experienced anything like this before, but I was comforted by my mother
and managed to sleep it through the night. In the morning we woke up made food, played board
games, and did normal things we’d do on the daily basis, but we were bored stuck in the house
for hours and decided to drive around, once I saw the damage the hurricane left I’ve never felt
more distraught in my life, there were houses already destroyed, debris all piled up together, and
roads being blocked by debris and flooded by the hurricane. After we drove around, we decided
to visit a family member to see how they were doing with the hurricane hitting hard and we
stayed for a bit playing board games with them and after we were done playing my cousin asked
me if I wanted to take a walk outside. We went outside in plastic raincoats and my cousin asked
me if I wanted to run down a hill and I thought she was crazy but then it took some convincing
for me to do it, I remember running and the rain hitting my face and it felt like needles hitting my
face since the rain had so much force and power, but it did ease down the feeling of me being
scared.
After a week of the hurricane hitting, it stopped but there was still no power, but shops
had a power generator and they opened back up. Since we had no water, the city would give out
water to neighborhoods and we’d bring out big jugs to use to take showers with, and taking a
shower never got rid of that nasty feeling on me since it was hot and humid then my parents
decided to camp at Sam’s club every night to buy a power generator, which was very difficult to
grab but managed to buy one. My parent’s order big freezers to use for their ice cream shop that
they wanted to open, and it was being shipped but since the hurricane hit there was no
transportation allowed to go through Puerto Rico. All the plans my parents had were slowly
going downhill and nothing wasn’t going their way after six months of living in Puerto Rico. My
parents talked to my sister and I saying that we were going back to the Arizona and hearing that
made me very happy.
The whole six months of living in Puerto Rico was a full roller coaster of emotions. But I
am glad my family and I were okay, and no one was harmed by the hurricane. Seeing houses
destroyed and people struggling was very heart-breaking. My family and I were very lucky on
the after affect. I hope those families that have struggled from it recovered, seeing how I ended
up made me realize I should value my life more since we only live once and to be more grateful
on how easy my family had it with the after affect.
