Although I went to sleep once, I woke up and I can’t sleep again so I’ll write. Around nine my place audibly shuddered and my toilet tank started filling with water so I knew I had the power and water back. Some of my friends aren’t so lucky and have only water. The first thing I did was take a shower.
I called my folks again and finally got through to my uncle. He’s fine and as soon as the quake finished he drove over to my grandparents to check on them. They’re fine too but they also had no electricity so their phone wasn’t working.
Even though I had no power or water for a couple hours, it was a very humbling experience. Armed with only the Maglite I settled myself into the night. I tried using my Zippo for light as well but it’s surprisingly unsuited for that. I had a liter of wash water tucked away but it was barely enough for me to wash my face and hands. If this situation had stretched on a couple days or a week, I’d have been in trouble. I need to prep a little bit more.
At 8.9 this earthquake is the biggest in the last 150 years or so. It’s odd that there aren’t more big earthquakes, in my opinion. I’m used to them, me being from California and all, but what surprised me about this one was that it lasted for like three minutes. The biggest one I remember was in LA when I was 8 or 9 and that was only one minute.
There was some crazy news footage. An oil rig burning off the coast of Chiba where Disneyland is located. The aforementioned parking lot completely flooded and churning cars around like they were toys. Students dressed in kimonos for their college graduation huddled outside the ceremony building that partially collapsed, killing a student. An old stone building crumbling and raining boulder-sized rubble onto the sidewalk below, and this in Yokohama which is nowhere near the origin.
And as I write this, an aftershock! After a big earthquake it’s good to be on guard for a month after, apparently. A drinking party that I was supposed to attend last night on a cruise boat in the Tokyo Bay was of course postponed, but we’ll see if it’s cancelled. Next week is a festival organized by the kids at my school but it’ll be held on a teeny little island that you need to take a ferry to so that may be in question as well. I’m far from the worst of the earthquake but everyone will still be on edge.
