I had no idea what the time it was when the monster hit……………… as it turns out it was in fact 2.28pm.
I was sitting at my desk in the pre-opening office working on a kitchen training power point presentation when all of a sudden everything around me started to frantically shake.
I was the last to leave the building- oh by the way my office is on the 6th floor of a relatively aged 8 story building. The stairwell is close by, as it turns out my regular journeys up and down the stairs for health purposes assisted me in my mad dash to escape from the trembling surroundings.
People were gathered in the alley below the building- I began to make my way to the apartment building whereby Maria my fiancée was located. I was desperately trying to get hold of her on the telephone to no avail; the lines were cut and/ or jammed. The city was in a made panic, I was lucky to flag down a taxi, I showed the driver the address, which I have written in the local lingo on a piece of scrap paper. It was a mere miracle that I managed to get a taxi. Chengdu has a major taxi shortage at the best of times. I reached the apartment in limited time, there was ruble scattered all over the road.
I gave the driver the money for the fare and ran into the building and found Maria. She was beside herself- in fact she was talking to her mother on the telephone when the magnitude 8 hit. We gathered some of our important documents and ran out of the building and waited downstairs. The neighborhood was gathering on the footpath area wondering what was going to happen next. After some time waiting and thinking about what to do next, mind you there was no information provided in a language that I could understand.
We went back into the building and started to arrange the personal belongings, packing a number of bags of essential items and left them nearby the door ready for evacuation. The electricity was cut, however the gas was still available. I began to prepare some penne bolognaise and there was a knock at the door- the person – in Japanese suggested we should leave the building due to the fact that the tremors would soon arrive. My instinct has got pretty good dealing with the language barrier on a regular basis.
We ventured downstairs with the previously prepare bags of essential items. At this point it was difficult to know what to expect. Would I see my cookbook collection again? Would I be able to find my collection of documents easily? The mind was racing.
At the base of the apartment building we were greeted by the English speaking Singaporean Spa Director from the same property I work with. He suggested that we go with him to the stadium- about a 30 minute walk away; we briskly made our way to the stadium with him. We stayed there overnight- afraid to sleep, it started to rain at 4.20am.
We moved onto the nearby Sheraton Hotel and waited in the lobby. It was at this time that we began to realize the extent of the earthquake via CNN. Devastating, whilst in the Stadium we heard the death toll was 70, CNN were reporting 10,000 deaths. The epicenter was a mere 90 km away- we both realized how lucky we were. So many thoughts were going through my mind during the previous hours. We trekked back to the apartment to gather a few items and went to stay in a fairly new local Hotel. We ended up staying there a couple of nights, all the utilities were available including the electricity.
A number of staff from my place of employment has family members that were directly affected by the tragedy. They seem to be handling the situation quite well under the extreme circumstances.
There have been some huge aftershocks- some 6.5 magnitude. You could almost call them additional earthquakes. Record has it that more than 7,000 have been experienced. In fact at the time of writing this report a 5.4 magnitude aftershock hit followed 20 minutes later by a 5.7.
The Chinese authorities need to be complimented on the way they have handled this catastrophe from the heartrending outset until this very day. In addition support has come from near and far away destinations- basically numerous nations have rallied together and answered the call for help without hesitation.
To this day the drama is still unfolding – numerous flood alerts have been issued due to formation of the so called “Quake Lake”, 100’s of thousands of people were evacuated from the region, landslides caused by torrential rains, a disastrous helicopter crash with claimed many lives.
The death toll continues to rise- it currently stands at near to 70,000 and is expected to rise to over 80,000. It is said that well over 370,000 people were injured and more than 18,000 are still listed as missing.
It has been stated that the reconstruction will take over 3 years to complete. The quake caused major damage in an area covering 100.000 square km, 19 out of the 21 cities and towns in Sichuan have been affected, a total of more than 5.47 million people have been left homeless.
From a personal viewpoint- Maria and I honestly realize that we are both extremely lucky.
Matthew and Maria
Chengdu, Sichuan, PRC
Note:- This is an updated post which was previously submitted on web.
