October 13, 2017 | UHCL Staff
When Ankita Verma and Astha Sharma arrived in Houston from Chhattisgarh, India on Aug. 9 to begin their graduate studies at University of Houston-Clear Lake, they were prepared to learn about a foreign culture, study in a new university, and begin a new chapter in their lives. However, within less than two weeks of their arrival, Mother Nature threw in a plot twist that no one expected: a very unpleasant visit from Hurricane Harvey.
“We had already connected with the Indian Student Association on campus before we arrived,” said Sharma, who arrived at the same time as Verma and two more friends from the same Indian town to pursue their master’s degrees in management information systems at UH-Clear Lake. “The ISA helps students with accommodations and other things, so we were acquainted with the association’s president, Raj Satya Maligi.”
But neither Verma nor Sharma, nor their friends were familiar with extreme weather events on the Texas Gulf Coast. “We started to hear about the hurricane warnings, but for the first two days, we thought they were making a big deal out of some rain,” Sharma said. “We are from central India where these things don’t happen. The ISA was very helpful in giving us weather updates.”
After watching the news and receiving repeated messages from Satya Maligi about the severity of the weather situation, Verma said she finally started to understand. “The news made us scared. Then when they started talking about evacuations, we really got nervous.”
The newly-arrived group was relieved when the storm passed and their apartment was not flooded. Satya Maligi said that UHCL campus police reached out to them and arranged a game of cricket in the Delta parking lot on campus. “We’d been inside unable to do anything for so long, so we were happy to get out and have some activity,” Satya Maligi said. “That’s when Chief of Police Allen Hill told me that one of UHCL’s administrators, Usha Mathew, had been flooded out of her home in Dickinson and asked if we could help.”
“That storm was one of the most shocking experiences of my life,” said Associate Vice President for Finance Usha Mathew. “I went to bed the night of the storm not realizing anything was wrong, but I woke up very early and when I put my feet on the floor, it was wet. I thought I had knocked over a glass of water by my bed and I actually got on my hands and knees to look for the glass, but everywhere I put my hands, it was soaking wet. That’s when I realized my house was flooding.”
By 7 a.m. Mathew said she stood nearly to her knees in water. “My husband and I were completely helpless,” she said. “This was the first time in 18 years of living in that house that it flooded, and I really was in a state of shock.”
After letting just a few of her UHCL colleagues know about her situation, Dean of Students David Rachita immediately began arranging to get help to Mathew’s home. “I didn’t know you’re supposed to tear out the sheetrock right away because of mold,” she said.
Mathew describes what came next as “many hands and feet bringing pure love.” She said the next day, Rachita and numerous other UHCL colleagues came to her aid as well as about eight students from the ISA. “It was incredible the way they all just stepped in, pulling sheetrock and insulation and dragging it all outside,” she said. “I asked the students when they were graduating, and they answered that they’d just gotten here!”
Verma was shocked when she saw the flooding in Mathew’s neighborhood. “I couldn’t believe it,” she said. “Everyone’s stuff was ruined outside, all the houses looked destroyed. But people were helping each other, motivating us. Lots of people came to help Mrs. Usha.”
“I’d never imagined such things in my life,” Sharma said. “I was speechless when I saw her house and her neighborhood. She had over a foot of water in her house. It’s a terrible picture I still have in my mind.”
Having never experienced a flood before, Sharma said she and her friends followed Rachita’s directions. “I didn’t know what sheetrock was. Where I come from, we just have walls. But even though we were so new to the country, we learned that people are really helpful.”
Verma said she knew Americans were helpful but didn’t expect to observe it firsthand. “Random strangers just showed up to help all around, that was really a surprise to see,” she said.
In total, about 15-20 UHCL faculty, staff and students came to Dickinson to help Mathew muck out her house. “They went the extra mile and touched me for life,” Mathew said. “It’s hard to explain what we went through, but I’ll be talking about it for the rest of my life. Students and faculty at UHCL genuinely care. They didn’t help because they had to. They did it because they were passionate to serve. Everyone has been a blessing to us.”
