State of emergency day 2

As predicted, we didn’t get a lot of sleep. There were only 3 or 4 aftershocks big enough to wake us, but they were also big enough to make it hard to go back to sleep afterwards. I didn’t really sleep properly until about 6 am, when it started to get light outside, which somehow made me feel safer (yeah, totally illogical, I know, but my brain was doing this weird connection along the lines of “it was dark when the first earthquake happened, so big earthquakes must happen in the dark, so when it’s light there won’t be a big one” and I couldn’t talk myself out of it), and I ended up sleeping through until nearly 10.

After a late breakfast we decided to brave the outside world, and walked up to the wee supermarket up the road. We’d originally been intending to get groceries on Saturday, which of course we hadn’t been able to do, so we were starting to run low on a few things (like something for dinner that wouldn’t involve creating loads of dishes – we have to boil the water to do the dishes, so we’re trying to minimise the amount we need to do). The supermarket was open, though several shelves were empty, either because they hadn’t had any deliveries (so there was no bread or milk), or things had been damaged falling off the shelves (the bargin bin was full of slightly dented cans), or just because everyone in Christchurch suddenly realised their emergency kits were lacking a few things (so things like batteries were in short supply). The woman on the checkout told us the cleanup yesterday had been a huge job.

Otherwise, the day’s been another surreally normal one. The aftershocks are pretty few and far between now, so we’re starting to relax a bit. The only real discomfort is that the weather isn’t great, and we haven’t got the fire going (just in case there’s another big aftershock) so it’s a bit cold. But we’re wrapped up warm (in fact, H is sitting watching TV in a sleeping bag) so it’s not too bad. Must be horrible for people with holes in their walls though.

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2 Comments

  1. Sending warm thoughts from the Gold Coast!

    Had a real WTF moment when discussing the earthquake with the kids when one of them came out with "but isnt it too dangerous to have an earthquake in NZ because of all the volcanos?" as if it was something you planned! Sad to say this was from the 15 year old *facepalm*

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