Life in France with no electricity
When there is no electricity at home for 8 hours, my husband could easily just drive us to a different place to enjoy the beach or just visit a new town. We could enjoy our picnic or lunch in a restaurant. We would just return home when the electricity is back. No electricity within a day is fine but not for several days. We have a fridge full of food. My husband makes sure to stock up our fridge good for two weeks. If no electricity, the food goes to the trash. We have cheese, milk, and meat inside the fridge. We need electricity.
I need warm water here to shower and so are the kids. It's unlike in the Philippines where we can survive taking a bath every day at just the normal temperature.
How can I wash the clothes and dry the clothes without electricity? I become so dependent on the conveniences here in France. And so is the washing the dishes, I need the dishes machine. If I do the handwash, the water here is freezing so I also need warm/hot water to wash the dirty dishes.
No Electricity in November 2023 with Tempête Ciarán
This is our chimney with fire and wood to help warm the place. We also had our barbecue here for our dinner. It was my first time experiencing without electricity for two weeks when the typhoon struck here in our place. Luckily, we have a generator. Among our neighbors here, we are the only house with a generator.
For two weeks, we just stayed at home. Nobody loves to visit places that were destroyed by the typhoon.
Here in France, I can't survive without electricity.
So, I have a realization and comparison while living in the Philippines without electricity.
Life in the Philippines without electricity
We live a simple life in the Philippines. We don't own a fridge so we just ask a relative to store our food in their fridge. We grew up without TV. Cooking is by the stove and sometimes with fire and wood.
I can say we can still live without electricity even for a day. Maybe, life is boring without gadgets and an internet connection especially now people are very dependent on it like it's our entertainment. Before gadgets and the internet, I remember we could just go to our neighbor's house who were my relatives just to play with our cousins, and the mothers and the aunties were just talking the whole afternoon.
If money is not the problem we could visit the shopping malls in the city where there is AC or air conditioning and so many restaurants and entertainment to choose from.
No Electricity during Typhoon
In the Philippines, we are used to being hit by typhoons every year. When it's just typhoon signal number 1, we can survive as long as the weather is good after the typhoon. Every time there is no electricity, we have a battery-powered radio to get some news. Sometimes there is no water but we are fine not taking a bath. Hahaha! But as long as you store water before the typhoon, you can have your quick bath by not using so much water. We are poor so we don't have a generator at home. We survived though.
But when I started working online in 2009, my earnings were dependent on having electricity and always connected to the internet. I need electricity as the breadwinner.
If money is not an issue, I can survive more in the Philippines without electricity. In France, we need electricity.