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Re: Powerful earthquake hits New Zealand?s second largest city - Christchurch
Re: Powerful earthquake hits New Zealand?s second largest city - Christchurch
Earthquake should be seen as the great escape
(OPINION)
By Jim Hopkins
5:30 AM Friday Sep 10, 2010
Excerpt:
...Every time he was interviewed, the Mayor of Christchurch said it was a miracle no one had died. We've lost things, he said, but we haven't lost people.
Along with the adjectives all week, Canterbury's been "quake-ravaged, quake-devastated" or "quake-stricken". Except it isn't. And it wasn't. Parts of it are and that is an awful thing.
But most of Canterbury isn't ravaged, devastated or stricken and neither is Christchurch. On Wednesday, Gerry Brownlee told an interviewer that 20 per cent of the city was a mess but 80 per cent was virtually unscathed.
And nobody died. In the past month, wild fires in Russia and floods in Pakistan and China have taken hundreds of lives. The Haiti earthquake killed 230,000 people.
And it was no more powerful than the one that shook an unknown fault here on Saturday morning.
The real story of our earthquake is that it has done so little damage and caused so little grief. The real story of our earthquake is that only 400 people in a city of 360,000 needed special shelter.
The real story of our earthquake is a hundred thousand unsung acts of kindness, publicly evidenced by all those Facebook recruits in Sam Johnson's Student Army.
Which brings us back to Tuesday's question. The host in Auckland was interviewing a helper at the Addington Welfare Centre. She said 189 people had stayed overnight and expected more may arrive.
"You must have heard some tragic stories," said the interviewer. The woman paused. She appeared to know what was expected of her and did her best.
"Well, some people are worried about their pets," she replied.
When we build a monument to mark this violent event, those are the words that should be carved on the plinth. Not to minimise or trivialise the damage done but to put it into context and to celebrate what is, in truth, a great escape.
Full text:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/new-zealand/news/article.cfm?l_id=71&objectid=10672257
Re: Powerful earthquake hits New Zealand?s second largest city - Christchurch
Earthquake should be seen as the great escape
(OPINION)
By Jim Hopkins
5:30 AM Friday Sep 10, 2010
Excerpt:
...Every time he was interviewed, the Mayor of Christchurch said it was a miracle no one had died. We've lost things, he said, but we haven't lost people.
Along with the adjectives all week, Canterbury's been "quake-ravaged, quake-devastated" or "quake-stricken". Except it isn't. And it wasn't. Parts of it are and that is an awful thing.
But most of Canterbury isn't ravaged, devastated or stricken and neither is Christchurch. On Wednesday, Gerry Brownlee told an interviewer that 20 per cent of the city was a mess but 80 per cent was virtually unscathed.
And nobody died. In the past month, wild fires in Russia and floods in Pakistan and China have taken hundreds of lives. The Haiti earthquake killed 230,000 people.
And it was no more powerful than the one that shook an unknown fault here on Saturday morning.
The real story of our earthquake is that it has done so little damage and caused so little grief. The real story of our earthquake is that only 400 people in a city of 360,000 needed special shelter.
The real story of our earthquake is a hundred thousand unsung acts of kindness, publicly evidenced by all those Facebook recruits in Sam Johnson's Student Army.
Which brings us back to Tuesday's question. The host in Auckland was interviewing a helper at the Addington Welfare Centre. She said 189 people had stayed overnight and expected more may arrive.
"You must have heard some tragic stories," said the interviewer. The woman paused. She appeared to know what was expected of her and did her best.
"Well, some people are worried about their pets," she replied.
When we build a monument to mark this violent event, those are the words that should be carved on the plinth. Not to minimise or trivialise the damage done but to put it into context and to celebrate what is, in truth, a great escape.
Full text:
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/new-zealand/news/article.cfm?l_id=71&objectid=10672257
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