Christchurch - remember that story?

Earthquakes, aftershocks, quakes, shakes - so many and so many ways they have affected this city.
Recently two visitors from out of town have mentioned the hope they noticed. Before, they say, this city was patching things up, making temporary solutions. Now, it feels big plans are happening, more permanent decisions are being made for a city on the rise again.
I know that hopeful feeling but living here, it alternates with a feeling of utter despair - which only makes me wonder, if I feel that way, how much worse must it be for people in the red zone areas.
There are days when I am just tired of the rubbish traffic, tired of not knowing where shops are now, compared to where they used to be, tired of having to pack up the house, tired of endless headlines of parts of my city beyond repair and being pulled down and tired of not knowing if there is another big shake coming or if December was it.
There are so many contrasts. I work at two places. One that is still in its usual premises, suffered minor damage but it is business as usual - albeit with a more intentional focus because of consequences of the quakes. The other is displaced from the red zone. Desks are tables, plastic bins are filing cabinets and everyone is doing their best to work  in far less than normal conditions. I said to a visitor from out of town, we could meet in the portacom and they thought it a weird thing to say. Portacoms and shipping containers are so normal now, I hadn't even thought about what I had said.
I think I know all the stories of those around me from that fateful February day but then someone tells theirs and I am undone.

A year on but still in it

A sand sculpture we made on 18 Feb
2011, when we had a different 2011
planned to the one that it became
on Feb 22 2011 at 12:51

It is hard to believe it is twelve months since the fatal quake hit Christchurch. The big quakes of September, June and December were nothing like February.
Its ramifications haven't gone away. We may have got through the first lot of temporary measures but for things like Lucy's school displaced from the city centre, there are the ongoing decisions of what the future might look like. So many times today, I realised things were different whether it was what I do with my day or driving down a road, now changed daily with traffic cones so one way is always two lanes, or driving past buildings that are gone. All of these little things I don't notice anymore but they are all due to February 22 2011.
The weather this afternoon was eerily like last year. When I think of the big September quake, I think of a loud mixture of noise that reminds me of Dr Who's TARDIS on the move. When I think of February I think of incessantly sounding alarms and that night of the silence between aftershocks - no power, no buses and little traffic on the road and the numbness of knowing people were dead.
I am still buoyed by the awesomeness people showed in those early days. The vast majority helped each other, whether we knew each other or not. I will never forget that. It took away my often cynical view of our city - when we needed each other, we really stepped up in a multitude of small ways.
I briefly saw a snippet of one of the memorial services on the television this morning and the sign guy was signing and it made me smile, how he became an instant hit. Flowers in the traffic cones - a little idea that spread city wide - have made me smile all day.
It is hard to know whether good or bad decisions are being made here about demolitions or cordons or city planning but it is a city where we all have to live intentionally. Small businesses have been hit so hard in the last year and without support, could easily disappear. Many other organisations and schools that have suffered are also working hard to keep moving forward. It really is a place that what we individuals choose, does make a difference to what will be here in the future. I think that is why I liked the flowers in the cones, in many small ways, we can decide what the city will look like.

Where's an extreme makeover when you need one?

Old lease sign on the inside,
red sticker on the outside

It was a weekend of contrasting cities.
On Friday night I went to a parent get together for Lucy's homebase (class). At one point we talked about February 22nd. It was the first time we had talked about it as a group and with Lucy's learning advisor (teacher). I learnt a lot more about just what it was like for Lucy on that day and what was going on the minds of those right with her.
On Saturday we joined a big queue to go onboard the US Globemaster - an enormous plane, heading down to the ice on the Monday. The US army guys were amused about how many people turned up to view it. Apparently they have never had so many in Christchurch come to one of their open day events.
Later on Saturday I flew out to Wellington and Sunday I was down on the waterfront. That afternoon was the Canadian, All Black game and fans of both sides were decked out. It was busy, exciting and entirely different to the World Cup experience in Christchurch. Not because we cannot have fun down here; the arts festival events I have been to, have been well attended and everyone was in a happy mood at the globemaster open day.
But there is an underlying weariness in Christchurch. We do get up and go to work and school and preschool, each day like before. It is a busy place but it is definitely not the same Christchurch of fourteen months ago.
I am not the same. On the Wellington waterfront I went to the toilet in one of the public toilet trucks. While in the cubicle, the door started rattling. I can still see the lock banging against its holder. I wasn't afraid but I became aware, that I had completely frozen and was just staring at the lock, waiting to see what would happen next - would it get bigger? Should I prepare? Then my brain caught up with what my body was up to. It was just somebody walking up the outside steps onto the truck. My body reacted without any thought from me. It was a strange thing.
Back here, as we landed in the city of fences, shipping containers (I never knew they had so many uses) and cones, I felt the weight fall on all of us.
I have been thinking about one of those episodes of extreme makeover, where in two days they complete a rebuild. But even just starting would be difficult - insurance would be the first hurdle.
Insurance seems to be especially hard if you are building or renovating. The easiest way around the problem currently is just to steam ahead uninsured. After the September quake there was the opinion that not having your house insured was insanity and only for the foolish - the quake being the proof. Now it seems the most logical solution to the current problems. How quickly things change here.
Almost everyday there are new consequences of the quakes. We have water restrictions about to start this week, for the first time in thirteen years. People, near abandoned homes still deep in liquefaction, are worried about the ongoing dust and how bad it will get with nor'westers this summer.  Even though we are fortunate to be mostly back to normal life - it is still thing, upon thing that keeps pulling us back to being quake town residents.

To Kiwis outside Christchurch

Here is what I wrote for my friend, who had been asked to comment on Christchurch at their work thing today in Wellington


Today is a memorial day for those that died and for our city. Please tomorrow and the day after, remember the living in Christchurch.
For many, I think this day has come too soon, not all the dead have been named, not all funerals held, schools are barely up and running, many businesses are still working out their future - Heck we can't even get into the middle of our city.
Personally, I am a bit scared of memorial day, probably like many here, I haven't thought much about the grief of this quake. Life has been too busy doing basics.
I am worried that if I take the time out on this day everything that has happened will hit me like an unwanted aftershock - The people I no longer will see, the change in our business, the terrible damage to the city, the changes to our own house. At some stage, I am going to have face these new realities.
After today's service - as the media moves on, Christchurch will still be here just starting to grieve; the elderly couple realizing they may not live long enough to see the city rebuilt, the kids missing classmates who have permanently left town, without getting a chance to say goodbye. People dealing with images in their heads who only say of February 22nd "I saw some things…..".
Everyday I hear of new situations that make my heart sad.
I think we are all still coming to grips with what has happened.
We are still having aftershocks that bring back memories of September 4th or February 22nd, depending on their shake.
We are still working out how our lives go from here.
Please remember us.

I'm a motorsport fan - so why do I care about Rugby?

Pre Feb 22, I was already sick of the rugby world cup; the disruption to the inner city in preparation, the stupid corporatey rules about what words businesses can and can't use in marketing. But Post Feb 22, I became quite a strong advocate that Christchurch should still host rugby world cup games. Today I realised, I have been fooling myself about my city. I knew we were experiencing a new normal at the moment, but I guess I always figured we could get back to proper "normal" in the nearish future.
This morning I heard a business consultant on the telly say business was not trying to get back to normal in Christchurch, it was currently in survival mode and then it would be finding a new normal.
An email from Lucy's Learning Advisor (otherwise known as her teacher) with a list of resources they needed made me realise, my relief at them finding a temporary location was only a very small part of getting the school up and going. Then I was confronted with all the small details - Lucy's bag is still in their school building in the red zone in the CBD. I need to find a new bag, some books and pens and pencils. Her pencil case is in the CBD. Her rain jacket and polar fleece she used to wear to school, also still in the CBD. In fact teacher's cars are still stuck in the carpark building in the CBD. I was thinking school being back was a step to a more normal existence but it is not normal at all.
This week I have seen a little of the better part of the Eastern side of the city - imagine gravel back country roads, that were previously busy, smooth city streets. I have seen a little of the inner city. I nearly cried when I saw the inner city, not because of the buildings that we've seen many times on the news but for the buildings that have never made it to the news that are lying as a pile of rubble, the windows smashed and still lying on the footpath. It is like a raw wound.
Seeing a little of both these areas, what hit me with a chilling lump in my stomach was the littler things, the folds in footpaths or new step ups in the ground that used to be flat. They reminded me of the amount of force that it took to push the ground like that and how that uncontrolled power felt.
By the time I saw the announcement on the World Cup I already knew what it would be. In some ways perhaps we needed this decision to make us admit that we really are in the middle of a national disaster. The word surreal has often cropped up in conversation, because our life here does feel unreal. We are three weeks after February 22 but sometimes it feels like only minutes and sometimes it feels like months. I may not be a rugby fan but it was really hard to hear that decision. It is one thing for us to say our city is munted. It is another for outsiders to tell us.