Earthquake

On Friday at about 2:45 Japan had a huge earthquake in Sendai--8.9.  Continuing our disastrous travel plan theme (many of you will remember the JTB-messed up plans to visit Kyushu that resulted in the ill-fated and canceled trip to Seoul when the North Koreans attacked the island there as well as the other trip the boys and I had to cancel due to local unrest), Sid and I had just picked up our Shinkansen tickets for Gifu (we were supposed to spend the weekend there) and were on our way to the subway station to go get Sam at school. Thinking we might need some cookies for the train ride, we popped into Belle Vie, a little train station store that sells things like western cookies. Then the earthquake hit. At first I thought someone was moving the shelves, but the staff herded us out into a little covered place above the station.  Across the street we could see these huge cranes on top of a building swaying back and forth--it looked like they would fall off. I don't know if anyone was in them or not, but it must have been terrifying if they were!

So, I told Sid, we had to catch a cab to get Sam. So, we ran to the main road where many people were waiting for cabs. But, I saw someone getting out of one and ran and caught it. Sid said, "Be honest, do you want me to go with you to get Sam?"  DUH!  So we went to pick Sam up, wending our way through traffic with a very excited taxi driver. When we got there I told Sid not to lose the cab and to go get Graham (Graham relies on the--then closed--subways to get back and forth from school).  So he left and I went to get Sam.  Sam's school would not immediately release him because there were aftershocks. In fact, part of the school was swaying.  Finally at 4 they cut the kids loose.  There was no cell phone service (almost no telephone service at all) and so Sam and I walked to the main road. No taxis. With the other 15 million people in Tokyo we began walking.  Every taxi was full--not that they could go anywhere as the streets were terribly congested.  So we kept walking. We walked out of Omotesando with its designer shops to Aoyama with its tired looking buildings to Akasaka Mitsuke with the Prudential Tower and Fulbright Office.  Of course, this was the one day I had not brought along my handy Tokyo map so we navigated our way by trying to read Japanese road signs and by following the subway map from station to station.  We stopped in at the Prudential Building to tell Fulbright we were okay--they also sent a Japanese speaker with me to JTB to refund our train tickets. Then we walked the rest of the way home only to find Sid and Sam just exiting the taxi at our building.  The walk was about 4 miles and change.

Abe San's junk came in handy, though. She has so much stuff packed into this little apartment that not much had fallen during the earthquake.  Her bookshelves are so tightly packed that the entire thing (attached to the wall) would have to fall for anything to be knocked off!  In the closet, though, Abe San's paper shredder had fallen--and scattered Abe San's shredded bills all over the place!

We are still having aftershocks but are now more worried about the nuclear plant explosions just north of Tokyo.  Many of the expats we know seem to be leaving for Hong Kong or Singapore.