She Chocolat from Governors Bay

Just before Knocking Off time the giving/caring/peaceful women from She Chocolat in Governors Bay came by with their portable Belgian hot chocolate, brownies and florintines. We were dying of heat exhaustion at this point but one sniff of this incredible brew and we were all over them like boys on mud. It was the richest, smoothest, most spicy (not hot spicy, but sort of nutmeggy and cinnamony) hot chocolate I've ever had. It was.... liquid heaven. I know I'll never want the instant stuff ever again.

Ladies, if you are reading this *please set up shop in Christchurch*

I heard that they were doing the rounds in the CBD but they have also been out to the relief/refugee centres in the suburbs, and to the rescue workers all over town. Que Dieu vous benisse.

City pictures

I gave my camera to some people who had to make food deliveries to workers around town today and they took these pictures...

This is the Catholic Cathedral. My Nana used to go to Sacred Heart School, and her brothers went to Xavier College - both of which were connected to the Cathedral. Nowdays the school is called Catholic Cathedral College, and I dare say they will be having a few extra days off school.

Why is it that the awesome Art Deco buildings are all falling down? Sob!

Team Japan

I really only saw the boys from Japan for a couple of minutes today. There were a few that came to eat quickly but for the whole day their teams just keep filing in and out of the base camp. I saw my super-cool-awesome guy as I was on the bus at the end of my shift - I was so relieved to see he is okay. They look *exhausted*. The team that came in at 5pm could hardly lift their heads to see where they were going and it was an obvious effort to carry their gear bags back to camp.
My thoughts and prayers are with you all.

Love and service from the Brethren Community

I know I will post about this again when I have more time but I really wanted to put up a few pictures of the Brethren community food tent vollunteers (yer yer I know I can't spell).
While these photos make it look like it was cold outside it was actually 25C, and about 120C near the ovens/BBQs/dishwashing station and pie warming ovens. We were dressed in thick cotton coats, even thicker aprons, hair nets and caps... so believe me we were warm! But no one complained. Sure, it was talked about but only in a happy teasing way. Again the jobs were assigned and everyone just got on with it.
Sophie especially deserves a shout out because she was on dishes from 9-5pm! She had a brief respite where she got to wrap knives and forks, but it was brief.
The community was there in force again to care for the rescue workers. Grandparents, mums, dads, my lovely students and many young adults. I even heard of one Mum that couldn't come during the day because she has 8 children to look after so she has been doing the 1am-9am shift!!
And all this is at a cost to the community. I served untold amounts of homemade bacon and egg pies (whoever made them, they were very popular!), carrot cake, brownies and amazing looking chocolate cakes. Community members from around the country cooked, packaged, boxed and shipped it all down - complete with little stickers/messages of love and support. If you have a Westmount school in your community you are lucky. These people are honest, dependable, charitable and faithful. I could name names, but I'd better not because I'll have this young man in school with me tomorrow...

Beautiful Sophie and Pat, hard at work on the dishes.

I know they look cool, calm and collected but they are ROASTING under these oh-so-fashionable outfits!

Oh yer... please note the bulk hand sanitiser! I have the cleanest hands in the land right now! Skinless, and caked in latex glove powder but SANITARY!

Not only did this gentleman man this BBQ all day, but he also had to deal with me sneaking in and stealing his scotch fillet steaks every 2 minutes. As you can imagine if the boys see their mates getting big juicy steaks for lunch they are *not* going to walk away with a mini quiche or a sausage! The line was about 100-men long at one point and as they only have a short time to eat (and therefore can't come back for seconds) I took pity on them and kept visiting my friends on the BBQs to get the "are they ready yet??" steaks (that were totally borderline cooked! In France they would have been called "bleu"... I called them "very rare but I think warmed thru") I loved the way the NSW guys kept saying "I'll take it rare! Don't worry about me! Just get me some steak!" The Japanese boys also loved it... I only had 2 vegetarians come thru the tent. Someone could do an interesting study on how many rescue workers are meat eaters :)

Camp Hollywood

In this photo you can see the new catering marquee going up. For an hour or so before this frame went up we heard all kinds of noises then suddenly there was a yell and the American USAR guys were everywhere and within 2 minutes the framework was up and 10 minutes later the canvas sides were on. Thanks guys! A few minutes later our special friends from America were on hand again to move our catering operation 20m to the right. They all poured over into the food tent and picked up our heavy gear and took it where it needed to go. We had been dreading the drama of having to shift it all but the Camp Hollywood boys did it all for us. I guess they didn't want lunch to be late!

2 minutes silence

There are no words for what happened today.

At 12.51 we gathered outside the shell of the CTV building to observe 2 minutes silence. I was lined up with the USAR teams from around the world...
It was very hard.

And silent. So silent. Even as we filed over to the site everyone was quiet in front of the burnt out rubble.

The ovens were off, lunches left on tables, and the tent city was empty.

If you come to visit, don't park in the driveway

At the request of M McAlpine here is a pic of our rapidly disintergrating firewall (it was once upon a time a chimney). Yesterday it had detached from the house and today it was like this. Another good shake and it is going down down down, down to China town. So don't park in the driveway unless you are well insured.

I have a feeling it is going to make quite a noise when it comes down and while it won't be good for the driveway (which is in a way worse state than the firewall anyway) I fear it is going to really hurt my hedging. Sigh. Is there no end to the mess I have to clean up?

Here's hoping the army comes and takes it down (and tarp's up the wall for me) before it falls down. And yes, before you ask, I reported it so they should be here in the next 48 hours or so because it is a danger to life and limb.

We really love Trish P in Auckland

I think I mentioned already that Trish sent us down a couple of camp showers and this awesome surround (she is so civilized - previous to this we have used our camp shower just out in the open... I must remember to buy one of these and take it to the bach) to share with others that are shower-free... The kids *love* it and just have the best time getting clean. I thought I'd share a picture so you can see the fun side of the earthquake (PS Lucy and Megane are playing "tag" in the background and Lucy has made herself a skirt out of Sebas' tshirt)

Dad's dinner

This is what Dad was given for dinner.... a "rat pack" from the NZ Army. Yes, you an see the tin foil poking thru. 6 bites of meat (unknown description) in a curry sauce, 2 pieces of potato (one seems to have a white sauce on it????) and either a piece of kumera or taro (I am really not sure). He did not take any out, or mess with it in any way... he open it before my eyes and I had the camera ready. It would not even be enough for Lucy.
And Army, curry and potatoes? REALLY????

Here is Dad with the kids (yes Chuck, Lucy is still letting Sebastien chose her clothes). Could you this this man eat THAT? No, I thought not.

So this is what I made for him and the lads for dinner; leg of lamb, brussel sprouts, roast potatoes, peas and carrots. Oh and real gravy. The little black things are garlic... I called Maria - best pork roast cook the world has ever known - for advice. She made me STAB it and poke the garlic bits in (it was inserting a suppository, and yes I've had to do that to people before)... no wonder I prefer to be vegetarian. AND she made me massage oil into it... anyway it turned out great according to Dad, and the dinner crisis was averted. Until tomorrow... So if anyone is reading this and wants to do something for the firemen, please, no more baking. They have muffins and scones (savoury, date, saltana, cheese etc) coming out their ears. When they refuel after 6-8 hours they don't want a muffin or a rat pack, they want/need meat. Burgers, roast dinner, casserole...

Oh, and Central fire station is being evacuated while I write this. It is comin' down. Being on the river and all it is no surprise - so don't freak out Sam and Jessica.

Before and after (just a few...)

Dad has my camera on duty with him tonight so he can take some pictures for the blog. He also has lots of stories to tell, but he has no time to tell them yet. The kids want me to tell everyone that they *love* having a shower outside in the garden - it is great fun :)

Stop worrying about my mental health everyone

Guys I'm fine! I really am! When I said there are worse things than death I didn't mean I am okay with dying. Heck no, I've got 3 kids and tons of stuff to do. I love my job. What I ment to say was that life has some risks and if living here means we might die because of an earthquake, then so be it. Moving away is not a miracle cure. If we go to Auckland we might be burnt up in a lava flow. If we go to Brisbane we'll be flooded to death. Montreal, well... there is SNOW there! I am not looking forward to the 20th March (next full moon, and the Moon Man says we are getting another big quake) but I'm not going to change my life because of this. I'll swerve big holes in the road, and I'll keep boiling water but I certainly will not stop parking in parking buildings or visiting the museum.

As for the kids. They are perfectly great. They are loving having time off school. Meg has got Dom to build her a new doll's house (and she is decorating it with homemade tables, patchwork quilts etc), Lucy and Sebas have build themselves bike jumps out of the liquifaction sand and are outside all day every day biking around. We had one small mishap when Seb built one so that you got some air and then had to swerve quickly or you would bike straight into the fence. Lucy didn't work that last part out and she slammed straight into the fence and she got off that bike MAD, she threw his bike aside and yelled "BAS! That was YOUR FAULT" but then she got her booboos kissed and she was right back at it.
Dom is at work. He had last week off so he could sort out our house, and now he is working again. He doesn't seem worried as much as he is annoyed at the extra work. But on the up side, I am feeding Dad and the boys at the fire station so he is getting all kinds of meat for dinner. Today I bought a leg of lamb (ugh, it was so gross to handle), yesterday was roast chicken... yer, he is lovin' it.
So, don't worry about us!
xx
:)

It has to be done...

Okay people, I'm going for a run. It has to be done. I can't get my shorts on! The kids probably won't even notice because they are watching a movie, and I am going to be going around and around the block... but I've got my fingers crossed The Big One didn't hit in the next 45 minutes.
PS Kanako, Hiroko... friends in Japan - you need to sign in on the voting poll on the right! And Dorota, where are you?

Rescue teams are still pouring in from around the world

We are so blessed. We are getting rescue teams from around the world to help find people and reunite them with their families. Today they had huge steel pipes place in several buildings so the rescue teams could get in deeper to find bodies. I know many people will be thinking "just get in some cranes and rip the rubble off" but it isn't like that. There may be pockets of safety that are protecting someone (who has a water bottle on them), and they have to work carefully as we do not want to lose a rescue worker... So they are slowly inching in inside steel tubes... Here are a few pictures of new teams that I found online today (since I didn't go into Latimer Square) Taiwan... Remember the huge earthquake they had a few years back? These are experienced men and women.

Queensland, Australia (they have been here for a few days but I love this picture)

Mexico (you can only imagine they they have done this before...)

China (in real life, their suits are hot pink. Handy if you need to be found in rubble, and it sure sets you apart from the other teams). I was very surprised to find that these men are really tall. At least as tall as the Americans, way taller than the English and the Japanese and definately bigger than the boys from Singapoure. And *so polite*.

So while we wait and pray these people from around the world are attending to our dead. On Tuesday there will be 2 minutes silence.

Today I finally started crying for what is lost.

Update on Dad

I just called his cellphone and Gaye answered. Dad is asleep (phew!) and he had a long night, but he is okay.
They hope to be able to go into their place in town today to get a few things out of the apartment (shoes, clothes for work) etc but it remains to be seen if they will be allowed access to the building. Gaye was back at work on Friday - I guess the hospital has to soldier on.
I start back at work tomorrow. Our children will not be back at school for "at least a week" so they will come out to my school with me. The CEO of our school has very generously said it will be okay in the short term to bring them with me, but I am aware it will be a distraction to the other students. Dom is also back out at his job tomorrow. This week the CIAL staff were helping with customer movement through the airport etc, so I don't know what he will be doing tomorrow.

My first thought this morning was "what is going to happen?"

I keep asking Dom this same question about school, repairing our house/land, the roads, when we can go running again, how will we ever cope with having the kids at school in the CBD etc. Today he said to me "you have to stop asking me that because I just don't know."

No one knows. I want to know, but it is not going to happen. We just have to live minute by minute, because that is all we have got. Yesterday as I drove into town to Latimer Square I realized that a lot of people would think I was *insane* for going in there where buildings are in ruins around me and more buildings are ready to come down with the next big shake and I realised I wasn't scared of that at all. It dawned on me that I really feel that if it is my time to die, so be it. Dom and the kids will miss me but we will be together again one day. Death is certainly not the worst thing that can happen.

I saw Dad! I saw Dad!

It was only for a few minutes, but I saw Dad! He looks great and is amazingly strong and awake looking. Sure, you can see he has had a few bad days, but his stamina is amazing. He is just starting a double shift (I guess that promise of the local lads not having to do overtime didn't last long) but he is up for it.
We are all thinking about you Dad, and love you
xx
Suzy and the rest of the world

PS I ment to take a photo but I just didn't get to it, sorry Sam and J

Uh oh!

Someone is in trouble! My friend took some lovely food to a firestation at dinner time and one of the men was just going off shift and told her "they don't need it, they have food" so she took it home and called me. Then I got a call from Dad so I told him what happened and let me just say that guy that turned the food away is NOT a popular guy! The boys play jokes on each other a lot but this one did not go down well. Needless to say I ran the food into him... but the lesson here is don't stand between a firefighter and his dinner! The guys need hot meat dinners and lunches - and from now on we will have to better coordinate the drop off!

While I was in town waiting for the food to be put together (for another drop-off) I heard cheering every few minutes. It seems that the Americans were playing baseball with our Civil Defense boys. They can really throw a ball!

The people in the catering tent were working hard as usual. Everyone has a job to do and they are doing it. Some guys are organizing the drop off of pallets of food, others are sorting it into the cold storage and packaged food caravan, others are chopping and dicing, there is always a few buttering bread and washing dishes. There are teams of people serving food and picking up the tiniest bit of rubbish, and yet more people going around emptying rubbish bins into dumpsters. No one is idle and everyone is cheerful. I am trying to pretend this is all that goes on. I see the teams all suited up and walking out of the compound, and of course we see exhausted teams coming back in... totally filthy and haunted looking... but they shower and change and then come with big smiles and line up for food. People are amazing. Everyone I see is just so happy to give, work and share without getting anything back. You really can FEEL love, it is like a tangible substance that surrounds people and is easily shared. When I am working at Latimer Square I feel it so strongly that I want to just stay there all the time. Coming home is lovely because I have my beautiful children, but going there is also like being home.

Day 5 - Saturday

I just woke up. I've been back in town again today and I came home so tired that I passed out on the couch for an hour.
Today I've been back on dishes, onion slicing, bread buttering and general clean up. I also delivered hot food to firefighters at Central (on Kilmore St) and to a couple of outstations. Dad and the boys had to head back to their station to use the toilet (funny, I never thought about this before but they probably don't want to ask the locals if they can use their toilet) so we rendez-vous-ed there and they got to enjoy some sausages and bacon. I also left some baked goods, drinks, fruit and other snacks from the catering tent. I made another drop off at a station further out and all they had was 3 bottles of water, some V drinks and few ration packs from the army that they will never be able to take the time to heat. As usual they were (embarassingly) thankful. They just don't get it that the rest of us are SO greatful for what they are doing that we will offer them anything they want to keep them going. Some friends from Church have prepared more food for "the lads" which will be dropped off at dinner time. Thanks girls.
I'm doing well. My respiratory system is complaining about the concrete dust and silt I've been breathing in but other than that I'm fine. Every so often I remember that we will probably get more big earthquakes and I feel frightened for the safety of my children, but what can you do? We don't want to leave Christchurch. We love it here and our lives are here. In the back of my mind I feel that 20th March is tick-tocking along (that is when Ken Ring says the gravitational pull on this area of the world will trigger another big one, and he has been spookily right about these other earthquakes) and I can't wait for it to be over and done with. As Dad so sweetly pointed out, if I am going to worry about that then I should REALLY worry about 2012 when the Mayans say the planets will be in alignment and will start up worldwide choas of the natural-disaster variety. Great.
So instead I have a chuckle about Chuck's naked Korean spa day and look forward to news from her about that.

Water water everywhere and not a drop to drink

I thought this was halarious - that OPEN sign was put up after the September 4 earthquake, I dare say it doesn't apply now!

The market gardener on Cranford St has artisian water and he has been generously letting anyone who wants it to come with their own container and fill up.

Here's the set up... a real kiwi job!

This is where we are getting our water from. We have to boil it because the waste water system is compromised and it is leaching into the ground all over the place, but it is good, nearby and free. Bless the family that owns this farm.

A couple more random pics taken from the car

This is/was the Knox church on the corner of Bealey Ave and Victoria Street. Gotta love that view...

And this is where Nana and Grandad got married. I know it will be a shock to Sam and Jessica but I've been working 20m from here all day and am now kind of used to it. In fact I'm now marvelling at the amazing woodwork under the slate tiles. It is a total shame it was covered for all these years. I have to say, I am so glad Nana is not here to see this.

The amazing Brethren community

I just can't say enough about how amazing the Brethren community is. They saw a need (food, the poor rescue workers arrive with their rations from home and that's it - there is no one to heat it (except the Japanese, they have a tiny food tent where they have little pouches of rice... and all the food I keep forcing on them) so the Brethren community here in Christchurch organized a catering tent and food and have been manning it 24/7 since the earthquake. I invited myself to help out, and they let me :) Here you can see lots of Westmount students and their parents. You will also see people from their community from around NZ and Australia who have flown in to help. It is truely the Gospel in action.

This is my boss making the coffee....

Hi Robyn!

This is my super-cool-awesome guy

He probably thinks I am stalking him.
He sure knows I took this picture... but he is so cute! He is part of the Japanese group so we don't chat exactly but we are friends xxx

The Aussies still love the beef jerky

I took this picture from the end of Latimer Square. On the left is what is left of the church Nana and Grandad got married in and on the right is the site of the TV building that went down.

The Aussies are working hard, and I wanted to get pictures of them roaming around in shorts and jandals but they kept me too busy delivering beef sticks and the like!

Here's the Australian supply tent. In the front is a crate of their stuff and in the background you can see they have a fire station like set-up with their coats, boots and helmets hanging on hooks. Maybe they saw my pics from yesterday and decided that draping them over their tents wasn't a good look! Especially since they are right next to the super organized Japanese who were putting them to shame with their shoe tent :)

Our kiwi boys

This is the building everyone is worried about. Can you tell from this picture that it is slumping towards the left? It is going to go down... we all know that. Every time there was an earthquake today (and there was a good'un that was just 1km down) everyone looks at this hotel. It is one block from the rescue HQ so everyone will be covered in dust and debris - but what can you do? For those that know Christchurch, it is on the Square.

Chuck, here is your family in action

Dad, do you recognise anyone?

Because this is Dad's family I made sure they had (vile, instant) coffee at all times. They started to accuse me and the other delivery girls of fattening them up!

While I saw lots of Dad's mates today I did not see The Man Himself. He was out on roofs and putting out house fires in Shirley. He went the whole day hungry and thirsty... but Dad, I was thinking of you and all my students were on the look out for you xxx