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| 2010-09-12 14:22 |
| Still alive and kicking |
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 optimistic |
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Back again. Electricity supply hasn't been the most reliable here. Just when they think they've fixed it, another big aftershock hits and we're down again. They boys at the electricity company are doing a great job. They say everything household in Christchurch is now reconected to electricity, and at least 95 percent of households have water again. Sadly, for some, sewerage will remain a problem for a long time to come, as there is extensive damage to the system.
How can so much damage be done by a fault line no one even knew existed? It's been sleeping for 16,000 years the geologists tell us. Well why did it have to wake up now! While it can't be denied New Zealand sits atop a major plate boundary, therefore earthquakes are inevitable, Christchurch was meant to be relatively safe, with no fault lines running anywhere near it. Liars!!
People are, for the most part, quite wonderful. It takes a disaster of this magnitude to remind you of that sometimes. There's Sam at the University, who organised all the Uni students out into the streets to help those most affected. And a large business in town, Smith and Smith, who offered the use of their trucks and staff to anyone who needed help moving from damaged homes - free of charge! The lovely Chinese man who went to his coffee shop, but when no one came in for coffee, he went out to find them and gave all the emergency workers and construction crews free cups of coffee. And the list goes on and on.
Driving through town today to my parents place I was stunned at the amount of damage, mostly done by falling chimneys. So many houses with holes in the roof, where the heavy brick chimney has smashed though it. How we all managed to survive is nothing short of a miracle. Just ask the young man in Darfield, when the entire wall of his bedroom fell off, and he fall out the hole - from the top story, landing by the car and surviving with minor cuts and bruises.
There goes another aftershock. Don't even bother getting up any longer. Anything less than a 5. and I'm not interested. They tell us we had 90 aftershocks on the first day, 87 the second, 80 the third, 56 the fourth, 41 the fifth etc etc, down to 11 yesterday. All up, over 350 of the things in a week.
And the whole of New Zealand has learnt a new word - liquiefaction. I can tell you it is a very, very, very bad thing when it happens under the house you are living on. The business district was hit hard by this quake, with many buildings crumbling, but in the residential areas, the houses destroyed were damaged by liquiefaction. That's what happens when the solid ground turns to liquid. One woman spoke of running from her home, roof caving in behind her, only to step out into her yard and find herself up to the neck in quicksand.
Most businesses, schools etc will be opening again for the first time on Monday, so it's back to work for me. Hopefully this will help us all get a feeling of normal life back again. Sadly for some, a couple of schools and many businesses may never open again. But we are a hardy people, and we will survive.
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| 2010-09-08 13:37 |
| Saturday 4 September, 4.25am |
| Public |
 exhausted |
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The Bee Gees seem to sum up the week best: "feel the city breaking, everybody's shaking, but we're staying alive."
The world changed forever on Saturday 4 September at 4.25am. I now understand the true meaning of the word "terror", as that is what I felt, 60 seconds of pure, unadulterated terror. 1 minute. How can everything come apart in one minute in the early hours of the morning leaving behind it a shattered city?
I woke with a jolt and was out of bed and in the doorway clinging on for dear life before i even knew what was happening. I have been through earthquakes before, but nothing like this. This was enormous, and it is violent. The house shook, the noise was horrendous, and I truly believed I wouldn't survive. And it just kept going, and getting more and more violent.
When it was over I realised I had survived, my house was still standing, and went to survey the damage. My neighbours were wandering around outside in a state of shock, and I joined them. We all sat around for the rest of the night drinking cups of tea and waiting for morning. We had no idea what morning was going to bring.
What morning brought was a shattered city. So many buildings in rubble, roads torn up, broken sewerage seeping out. My beautiful city will never be the same again. All it's residents are still walking round in a state of shock. And the tension can't go away because the aftershocks just keep coming. You fall asleep and you are jolted awake, running for the doorway again, memories of Saturday morning in your head when you thought you were going to die.
But there's also the miracle. The earthquake was a 7.1 - same strength as the one that hit Haiti earlier this year. It was very shallow, at only 10km deep - Haiti's was 12km deep. It was close to an urban population, same as Haiti. But that is where the similarities stop. 250,000 people died in Haiti. No one died in Christchurch. There were injuries, but only two were serious, and not one life has been lost. Our mayor summed it up best when he said "Everyone lost something. No one last someone." There were so many stories of lucky escapes, narrow misses and sheer miracles. We have all lost so much, but we are truly blessed to all be alive.
And 60% of the city is still standing. Many homes and buildings need repairs, but they survived. Strict building codes work. Even buildings that had to later be condemned and torn down stood long enough for the occupants to get out. And I have to quote a young Saudi student studying in the city when he said "truly, New Zealand is God's favoured country. Last night he spared every one of it's people".
My home is still standing. No major damage. And scary as it is every night to lie in bed (I find I am now afraid of the dark and the things that go bump in it), my home survives every aftershock. And the cat has survived too. a little shaken, but okay. Turns out he is a good indicator of aftershocks. When he turns to look at me suddenly with big, scared eyes, I know to brace myself for yet another of the over 300 aftershocks we have had since Saturday morning.
And the government and people of New Zealand have been wonderful. The prime minister has been here three times. He has set up an emergency fund. The two major political parties have put aside all differences to concentrate on helping us. They are rushing though laws to allow red tape to be done away with so Christchurch can be rebuilt and up and running again as quickly as possible. They have even guaranteed to make sure all workers will be paid in the next couple of months even if we can't work. And if the response from government has been extraordinary, the response from the frightened citizens of Christchurch makes me proud to be one of them - with neighbours all checking on neighbours, everyone making sure everyone else is okay, 2000 university and high school students going out to the worst effected neighbourhoods to help with the clean up. Everyone behaving, doing what the authorities ask - no fighting, no looting - bringing out the best in everyone.
And that was another large aftershock, so I'd better go and get a cup of tea. Tea is wonderful for calming frayed nerves. Please, God, let these aftershocks stop soon, I don't know how much more we can take.
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| 2010-05-17 13:21 |
| I'm in love with Supernatural |
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 giddy |
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Got tired of waiting for Supernatural season 4 to appear on New Zealand TV so ordered the DVD's from Amazon. Finished watching them yesterday.
All I can say is when is Season 5 due out, cause I want it now! And also, Castiel.... yummy.
Speaking of Castiel, he would make an interesting companion for a certain ancient Immortal. Ah, the dreams I'm having - totally X rated.
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| 2009-11-17 13:35 |
| Doctor Who |
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 lazy |
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I have been watching lots of what it seems we are now calling Classic Doctor Who recently. I started from William Hartnell and worked my way right to the end of all the DVD's I have (which seem to be a hell of a lot).
And I made a startling discovery - I really, really, like the second doctor, Patrick Troughton. He's fantastic. There aren't a lot of 2nd doctor stories still around, and some of them that are, are not the greatest stories, but Patrick Troughton is wonderful in even the most useless stories.
For so long I have been biased towards the 4th Doctor, thinking no one who came before him really matter, and the ones who came after certainly didn't. But that has all changed - the 4th Doctor still reigns, but sitting right beside him is the 2nd!
I am so very sad that there are so many 2nd Doctor stories I will never get to see. I recently found a website with transcripts for all the missing episodes, and some of the missing stories looked fantastic. I really missed a treat by being born too late.
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| 2009-11-03 13:40 |
| The family |
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 frustrated |
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I am attempting to do the impossible and trace my family tree. Particularly interested in finding out where in England they all came from (and yes, all roads do seem to lead back to England). Recently I found the name of one set of great great grandparents. There names? John and Susan Jones. Oh, great! No trouble tracking that! I also have a Jane Brown and a Rebecca Smith amongst my ancestors. Seriously, people, couldn't you have had some original surnames?
I have found out that the site I really need to access in order to find the English information is ancestry.com. Unfortunately I cannot afford the $200 per year subscription fee! It is very frustrating as I know the information is there, I just can't get at it.
So far it would appear my ancestors come from Northumberland, Co. Durham, Lancashire, Yorkshire, Northants, Kent and London. It's the London/Kent ones who are giving me trouble. Alfred Charles and Rose Rogers of London where are you?
Interestingly, all my ancestors seem to have come to New Zealand between 1858 and 1875. Which is cool, as 1850 was the earliest emigration to here by the British.
And I have found one skeleton in the closet. My great grandmother Clara had a daughter at age 17 when she wasn't married. Shock, horror! Then along came great granddad William (son of the aforementioned Alfred and Rose), thirty years older than Clara, who married her and they had my grandfather. Then I find William's death certificate and it tells me very interesting things that no one in the family knew. He was married before he married Clara, his first wife having died five years earlier, and he had a daughter with her, who obviously lived into adulthood. My mum never knew her father had an older sister.
This family history stuff is addictive.
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| 2009-10-08 11:03 |
| We told them, but they didn't listen |
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 bouncy |
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My old workplace is in big trouble. They were meant to be renewed for a five year period as the standard setting body for the industry, but have only been given a one year provisional renewal by the government, and been told to sort out their governance and management issues!
Yes! We told them they couldn't get away with doing the things they were doing, but they didn't listen. Now they are paying for it. And the best thing is it is management and governance that has been singled out as the problem, so my ex-boss can't put that on someone else like he ususally does!
After all the pain I went through at that place I am so glad to see the problems ex-boss created finally coming home to him.
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| 2009-08-16 14:27 |
| Busy |
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 busy |
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I can't believe how busy my new job has been. I haven't had a moment to catch up on my journal for ages it seems. I never knew there were so many people in my little city that needed educating so badly they all had to come right now.
I have enrolled nearly three hundred people over the last month, and every single one of them had to spend up to 30 to 60 minutes with me. It's just too many people and not enough time to fit them all in!
Now we get an email from the Dean saying polytec has reached the maximum number of people it can take, and no more enrolments will be accepted for the rest of the year! People who have been working there for 20 years say this has never happened before. We evidently enrolled twice as many for this semester than we had at the same time last year.
So, given that my job is enrolments, and we are not allowed to enrol anyone, what am I supposed to do until January? Sit twiddling my thumbs? Although, that sounds nice right about now, and if I can actually get paid to sit twiddling my thumbs, that's even better.
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| 2009-07-06 15:41 |
| Ask a stupid question... |
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| giggly |
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I work at a polytechnic, and as always, when the course is finished they need feedback from the students. One student responded thus:
The dumb question: How did the physical environment contribute to your learning?
The student's answer: It was a f*****g classroom! What am I supposed to say? It was a magical fairy world with unicorns and fairies galloping around? This made my learning whimsical!!
Ask a stupid question...
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| 2009-05-12 13:31 |
| Books I read recently |
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 hungry |
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I really enjoyed Matt Ruff's book 'Bad Monkeys'. Quite short, easy read, but with a twist in the tail I didn't see coming (but I should have). The story is about a woman who has been arrested for murder, who says she works for an organisation called 'The Department for the Final Disposition of Irredeemable Persons', aka Bad Monkeys. Of course she ends up in the psych ward, were she proceeds to tell her story to the psychiatrist.
I've also just finished reading Julie Phillips book about SF writer James Tiptree Jr. It was wonderful. Very well written and researched, and what an extraordinary life she had. It doesn't matter whether or not you have ever read any of Tiptree's stories - I hadn't, though I knew who she was. Now I have ordered a collection of her short stories from the bookshop. I highly recommend this book.
Now it is lunchtime, so I am off to heat up my soup.
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Just purchased a whole pile of new books. Amongst them is a book called Bad Monkeys by Matt Ruff, and I was hooked when I read the line "it all started when I figured out that the janitor at my high school was the Angel of Death". How can I possibly resist a line like that?
I also got the final two books in Michael Stackpole's most recent series, the last book in Chris Wooding's recent series, Territory by Emma Bull, Dragons of Babel by Michael Swanwick, and Kalpa Imperial by Angelica Gorodischer (translated by Ursula Le Guin).
As the met service says it is going to be stormy right through until next week, I think I have my free time all sorted. Good book, hot chocolate, warm cosy room, cat curled up beside me. My idea of heaven.
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| 2009-04-01 09:17 |
| (no subject) |
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| happy |
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Today is a good day. Today everyone at my workplace get a pay rise of 4%. Also today the government's recently announced tax breaks start, and I drop from paying 33% to 21% in tax. This will give me around $25 per week extra in my pay. Interest rates have dropped again, which means I am now paying around $50 less on my mortgage, which is now at only $28,000. A couple more years and I am done with that!
April 1st may be April Fools Day, but it's turning out pretty good.
The sad news for today was hearing that Andy Hallett (the green demon from Angel) had died. Very sad. He was much too young.
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| 2009-03-22 13:35 |
| First Week |
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| lethargic |
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I've finished my first week at my new job. While there were times I thought, 'oh no, what have I done, I want to go back to my old job where I know what I'm doing', on the whole I believe I made the right choice. Though at the moment I know absolutely nothing, everyone is very friendly and helpful, and if it all gets too much there is a library on site, and a wonderful bookshop right across the road. I forsee a future with no money in my future. I currently have 13 books on order.
Speaking of books, I recently finished Neil Gaiman's 'Graveyard Book'. I don't care that it was marketed as children's fiction, it is a great read. Gaiman has become one of my all time favourite authors. Also currently reading a wonderful book by a New Zealand author, Kate de Goldi, called 'The 10pm Question'. It's about a boy who worries about everything, and at 10pm every evening goes and asks his mother a question, hence the title. I rarely read anthing that isn't SF or fantasy, but I am really enjoying this book.
Also started 'The End of Mr Y'. Fantastic book. It is a book about a book. While I am reading the book, the main character is also reading a book called 'The End of Mr Y'. A book that they say if anyone reads a curse will fall upon them.
Well, enough of this, I hear my books calling my name, so I'm off for a lazy Sunday afternoon of reading.
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| 2009-02-17 13:48 |
| Thank you Jetstar |
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| bouncy |
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Jetstar just announced today it will be flying domestic flights within New Zealand. To celebrate they were offering cheap flights, only available on their website between noon and 2pm today. Although it was nearly impossible to get on their website, I perservered and I got one!
It cost me $2 for a return flight! The normal cost would be around $98!
That's a cheap weekend away.
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| 2009-02-13 10:53 |
| Friday the 13th |
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| cheerful |
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I'm half way through Friday the 13th, and so far nothing bad has happened. In fact, quite the opposite. It was raining hard as I was getting ready to leave for work (I walk), but just as I got outside it stopped. Then just as I was walking in the office door it started raining again.
I also got to tell a woman who has given me no end of trouble over the past six years that I am leaving. That was good.
I've started handing over all my work to other people. Again, nothing but good there.
And the 'Last of the Summer Wine' DVD's I ordered were delivered today, just in time for the weekend.
All things considered, this Friday the 13th is turning out pretty good for me.
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| 2009-02-12 08:41 |
| It's raining |
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| happy |
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It's raining! I know I'm talking about the weather again, but it's raining! This is the first rain we have had for the year and it's nice to see some wet stuff falling from the sky finally. Not least because it's taken the fire risk from extreme to not likely. My plants are loving it. Even my cats are happily playing in it!
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Yesterday they were predicting temperatures could soar again to 40 degrees (104 fahrenheit). We prepared ourselves for this, but what we got was a strange overcast day where the sky was an odd orangy colour, and the sun couldn't break through, resulting in temperatures not rising much above 30 degrees (86 fahrenheit).
So what about that odd coloured sky? Orange sky is not natural. Turns out it was haze caused by the bush fires in Australia! Which means it travelled all the way across the Tasman Sea to settle over New Zealand. Odd that such a tragedy in one country should bring relief to another.
Today the haze is gone, and the temperatures expected yesterday are here. Today we cook.
My thoughts are with the people of Victoria today and the tragedy they are experiencing. I guess we pray they get rain soon, and lots of it.
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| 2009-02-05 12:06 |
| Yes! I've done it! |
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| jubilant |
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Finally, I've done it! My resignation letter has been written and I am out of this place! I am so excited I am bouncing off walls. I can't wait to get out of here, it has become a very unhealthy place to work. Goodbye, and I will not miss you.
I have a brand new job waiting for, contact is signed and I start next month working with international students at Canterbury University. It's going to be fantastic!
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| 2009-01-25 14:50 |
| Where did it go? |
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| apathetic |
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Where did the holiday go. Four glorious weeks off, and it's over now. Tomorrow I have to go back to work. I would do almost anything to avoid having to go back to that place, but I can't think of how to get out of it. I was meant to return to work last Thursday but couldn't bring myself to do it, so I killed off an uncle (sorry unc), and rang in and said I had a funeral to attend. That got me two more days off, but I can't do it again so tomorrow I will have to face my dreadful fate and go to work.
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| 2009-01-11 17:46 |
| Hot! |
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 hot |
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40 degrees! (or 105 if you use the Fahrenheit scale)! What kind of temperature is 40 degrees? That is ridiculous. I can't do anything. My little town is not used to anything over 30 (86) degrees, and has never since recording began, had a temperature like that! We are sweltering, even my fan doesn't work anymore.
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| 2008-12-25 22:39 |
| I guess that was Christmas |
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| happy |
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It's 10.30pm on Christmas evening and everyone has gone to bed except me. I guess that was Christmas. As Christmas' go it wasn't a bad one, in fact it was pretty good. I spent some happy time with the family, got some nice gifts.
However the best gift of all happened at church this morning were I ran into an old and dear friend I haven't seen in over fifteen years! And it was as if we had never been apart. She and her family have just moved to town so we are planning to get together soon. It's quite amazing, she has a 13 and 11 year old who I had never met. It was just fantastic seeing her again, we were best friends at school together but lost touch when I moved to Africa.
For all those who have yet to have their Christmas, may yours be as lovely as mine was.
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