I live in Miami, where the hurricane caused severe damage and was predicted to be even stronger. Irma is the biggest Atlantic Hurricane ever recorded. The Bahamas and the keys are devastated, as well as Haiti and parts of Cuba. When it got official that schools would close for the rest of the week, and people were asked to evacuate as fast as possible, my parents and I started to search for ways for me to escape the horrible storm approaching.
But there were none: all the flights were sold, you were not able to fly out of Miami, not to Atlanta, not to New York. We have friends in Atlanta whom I could have stayed with, but there was no way out.
The options were extremely limited, but with the bad predictions, like floodings, no electricity and no service I had to get out. It was hard for me to leave, as I finally started to built up a life that I now had to leave after just a month there. Even just for such a small amount of time, it felt wrong.
So what can you do when there is no way out alone?
Right, somebody needs to get in and take you somewhere safe. So that's what we did: my mum flew from Vienna to Miami on the next day! We booked her ticket at 8 pm Miami-time and she arrived here at 3 pm the next day! She rented a rental-car and picked me up after school.
I packed all my belongings into my bag and we drove off. My host family really supported me, and totally understood my problem. My illness makes everything more difficult, but also more dangerous!
If the area floods: for everyone that's just a little bit of annoying water, but for me it's the worst bacteria cocktail ever!
If there's no electricity: for everyone that means that it's hot and there's no way to charge the phones, but for me that means not being able to do my treatments and therefore not being able to breathe...
I am just not able to stay in such an unsure situation, and being aware of that helped me a lot coming to terms with the new situation.
The first day we drove for about 5 hours, and slept in a hotel next to the highway. We continued driving on the next day at about 9 a.m. but the traffic was really bad, so we arrived in Orlando around 4 pm. We stopped to eat and tried to book a hotel room, which we kind of did. The big question was: do we stay in Orlando for the hurricane or do we drive to Atlanta and stay with our friends? At first we booked the hotel room for 5 nights, so until the hurricane was gone again, but after talking to the friends and them encouraging us to just keep driving because "you never know" we changed our mind. We drove there with the intention of declining the hotel room, and rather just stay one night. When we arrived at the hotel, it already looked full: people with several Suitcases, BBQs and even Wheelchairs on the roof of their cars. But we booked a room, so we were positive that it would work out. When we went inside we were both so exhausted that we thought about sleeping there until Midnight and then getting up and driven during the night because maybe the traffic wouldn't be as bad. So we talked to the receptionist, but she told us that she couldn't find any reservations under our name, and when we said that we booked the room today she just laughed because the hotel had been sold out for a week. 
So we decided to continue driving and look for another hotel room, or in the worst case sleep in the car.
We drove until around 11:30 pm, the traffic was not better so we tried driving around the traffic jam, over country road and trough woods. I really missed woods, but apart from that driving in the dark was just exhausting. So we decided to go back to the highway and exit at the next hotel.
When I got out of the car, asking for a hotel room: I stood in line with a pregnant lady in front of me and an elderly women, who carried a bird in a cage, behind me. None of us got a room... so the worst case scenario took place: we parked the car in the parking lot, and slept there. We were two of many people who slept in the car that night, which made it less scary. That night was actually the first night I dreamt in english! It took a month for me to finally dream in English!
The funny thing was just that the dream was supposedly so funny (I don't remember it anymore) that I woke up laughing?
I laughed so hard that I actually woke my mum up too!
So as we were both up we decided to start driving again, and it really went good, until I fell asleep in the car because we only slept for an hour. My mom stopped for breakfast, but she stayed in the car for about an hour longer so I could sleep. After that, she woke me up and we went inside to eat.
Everyone was nearly asleep over their meals, and the waitresses seemed to be as well, as the restaurant was open 24 hours due to the hurricane. After that we continued driving. It took 26 hours, straight driving to come from Miami to Atlanta. When we finally arrived at the house of our friends I was exhausted. It was so nice that they let us stay with them, and I think I was never as happy to finally be able to shower and lay in a bed.
In the following days we did lots of activities because Irma was nowhere to be seen yet.
We went shopping, visited the Georgia Aquarium, ate Chinese (first time after a month) at Ponce Market and ate at the Cheesecake Factory. It was a very fun Weekend, even tough I was constantly streaming "The Weather channel" and waiting for videos from friends who stayed in Miami. We did eventually loose power for about 8 hours. It was a weird story because coming from Austria, I am used to huge storms. Without school getting cancelled, and malls closing. The storm in Atlanta was enough to let all the malls close at 4 pm. When we went to Target after the mall closed, the electricity went out and we shopped in the dark with flashlights on.
On Thursday (so after staying in Atlanta for 5 days) we finally got a flight back to Miami.
I apologize for the inconvenience, and as soon as I have service again, I will update this post and (finally) upload the post about my flight and my first week...
please share this and excuse the lack of posts in general. Today is Thursday and school starts again on Monday. I hope I will have service until then.
Thank you for spending your time with me,
I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.
Leonie Pohl
09.14.'17
