More About Earthquakes

The death toll in Sichuan keeps rising - it's up to almost 10,000 now. Here in Xi'an there were 80-odd deaths - they must have been rather unlucky people who happened to be in the wrong place when the earthquake struck.

The earthquake itself struck in the early afternoon on Monday. There was an aftershock at 4am the next morning that I slept through, and was much milder. People here are really not used to earthquakes - or any sort of natural disaster, by the looks of it, because yesterday everyone went crazy.

Because of the earthquake the day before, everyone went outside. People left their apartments in droves, and a security guard knocked on my door and suggested (ordered? I couldn't understand a word he said, so I'm not clear on that part) that I go downstairs. Outside, lots of other people were leaving too, and some of them had packed their bags. I'm guessing a bunch of people left for more Northerly provinces. Throughout the day I kept hearing (from my English-speaking friends) reports that there would be another aftershock (it never came). The library square, normally quite empty at that time of day, had people all around the edge, resting in one of the places not right next to a high-rise building. Classes yesterday were cancelled (the school is on the 16th floor).

Everyone was very seriously freaked out by this. I haven't lived in Wellington much but I was born there, so a little earthquake (and in Xi'an it was little, even if it wasn't elsewhere) doesn't faze me, especially when I don't even feel it. It just ended up leaving me somewhat bemused at everyone else running around like a mad chook.

Things seem pretty normal today. I don't know if I have work tonight or not; everyone else seems to have calmed down, but I hear that some parents are going to keep their kids away until after the weekend. Mind you, if an earthquake did strike while classes were on, I don't fancy trying to herd 60-100 kids down 16 flights of stairs using about 12 adults without losing any of the kids.