Anniversary
Feb. 22nd, 2021 10:04 pmTen years ago I was trying to get to sleep on a mattress on the floor of the spare room at my best friend's house, my dog in his crate next to me and another family in the living room. My best friend's husband had dug a toilet in the back yard, we had no power and very little water, phone networks were unreliable, internet precarious, and the news all too much. Every few minutes another aftershock hit and the land groaned.
Ten years ago just after lunch I walked across the road to the main building. My phone was low on battery and I took the charger with me, intending to plug it in. I'd just gone inside a set of glass doors and was by the stairs going up to the mezzanine floor when the 6.3 quake hit. I grabbed onto the stair railing, as did another woman, and we clung on as everything shook and shattered around us.
Today at that time I stood in a park and listened first to the moment's silence, and then to the names of all 185 people who died in that quake.
My house was red-stickered and red-zoned after the quake. I broke in through the cordon twice to get stuff out; then in May I had fifty minutes supervised access to get what I could. We got general access in July (by which stage I think everyone's house had been broken into; I didn't lose much, but I had to question the burglars' decision-making when they opened a fridge that had had no power for five months) and I moved back in in December. And then out, of the house and Christchurch, the following July. Final settlement was another four years later.
Because the phone networks were down I used the battery power I had to take photos as I walked home.
( Some of these photos under the cut. )
I lived in Christchurch all up for 2 stretches of four years. With any place I've lived I end up with a mental map that is full of ghosts; buildings that aren't there, spaces that are no longer empty, road changes and new suburbs. My mental map for Christchurch is more haunted than any other, and it's difficult to go back there; each time I do confirms more places that have been erased. It's hard to balance holding on and letting go.
Ten years ago just after lunch I walked across the road to the main building. My phone was low on battery and I took the charger with me, intending to plug it in. I'd just gone inside a set of glass doors and was by the stairs going up to the mezzanine floor when the 6.3 quake hit. I grabbed onto the stair railing, as did another woman, and we clung on as everything shook and shattered around us.
Today at that time I stood in a park and listened first to the moment's silence, and then to the names of all 185 people who died in that quake.
My house was red-stickered and red-zoned after the quake. I broke in through the cordon twice to get stuff out; then in May I had fifty minutes supervised access to get what I could. We got general access in July (by which stage I think everyone's house had been broken into; I didn't lose much, but I had to question the burglars' decision-making when they opened a fridge that had had no power for five months) and I moved back in in December. And then out, of the house and Christchurch, the following July. Final settlement was another four years later.
Because the phone networks were down I used the battery power I had to take photos as I walked home.
I lived in Christchurch all up for 2 stretches of four years. With any place I've lived I end up with a mental map that is full of ghosts; buildings that aren't there, spaces that are no longer empty, road changes and new suburbs. My mental map for Christchurch is more haunted than any other, and it's difficult to go back there; each time I do confirms more places that have been erased. It's hard to balance holding on and letting go.