Shaken

October 15, 2013

I'm staying on the fifth floor of an eight-story building, so when an exceptionally strong earthquake hit Cebu and about half of the country this morning, I had nowhere to hide. It was several minutes past eight, and I had been asleep for four or five hours. When I woke up, the bed furiously shaking, the whole building rumbling, I knew right away that I was in a life-threatening situation.

I can say that I have the right amount of knowledge on what to do in such a situation. I was occupying the upper portion of a double-decked bed, so I climbed down as fast as I could and crouched in the lower deck, my head between my knees, my hands on top of my head. I was in a dangerous place, in a dangerous moment, but the best action I could take was be still and go through the ordeal, and since my roommates were not around, I had to go through the ordeal alone. I knew that if I ran out of the room, if I tried to flee from the danger, I would only be in greater danger.

The earthquake would last for up to fifteen seconds only, I told myself, but after about twenty seconds, the tremor had not yet stopped and seemed to go on forever. I felt as though I was inside a blender. In my mind I said, “God, God.” Now I had been an atheist for at least ten years, and some devout Christians might say that in those crucial seconds, I had a change of heart. When I had nothing left to hold on to, I came back to God. I found refuge in his divine protection. This was not the case, however. I uttered the word out of habit, for I was raised in a traditional Catholic home. As a believer of science, I knew no god could stop an earthquake, and I had to accept whatever would happen to me if the building I was in creaked, leaned, and eventually collapsed. “So this is how I would die,” I told myself, resigning to my fate. But as soon as I thought that, the room went still. The earthquake stopped.

I learned from the news later that the epicenter of the earthquake was in the neighboring island of Bohol, where the magnitude was 7.2. The earthquake lasted for about a minute, and geologists recorded more than a hundred aftershocks, many of which I personally felt. The tragedy left about seventy people dead and a few hundred injured in Bohol, Cebu, and other parts of the Visayas. The major old churches in Bohol crumbled down, and the bell tower of Basilica del Sto. Niño here in Cebu was toppled. The losses are yet to be determined, but it’s not far-fetch to assume that it could be more than a billion pesos, taking into account the damaged infrastructures and the lost income of outsourcing companies that had to suspend operations that day.

I was relieved when the earthquake stopped, but I knew that there would be aftershocks and I had to leave the building. I grabbed a shirt, my room key, and my wallet. I can no longer remember if I was sleeping in my shorts or I had been wearing boxers and I just put on a pair of shorts after the earthquake. I switched off the ceiling fan, pulled the wires off the socket, and walked down the stairs with the other dormers. There were at least two hundred of us, in various levels of dishevelment and undress. Some were barefoot. Because it was a holiday, many of us had been lazing on the bed or lounging on the couch, watching TV.

The ground floor was crowded, and there was no open space near our dorm, so I walked to a mall across the street and stayed in its parking lot for the next thirty minutes. Only there, while sitting on the empty stairs, did I realize that my knees had been shaking. It was the strongest and longest earthquake I had ever experienced. I pondered on the fact that I could have lost my life in the disaster, that my name could be in the list of casualties that would appear in the papers the next day, that in an instant my existence could have ended and the world would still go on.

The earthquake has shaken us in more ways than one. In my case, I was able to clarify my values more. I found out that in a seemingly hopeless situation, I would rely on my knowledge. I’d do whatever I could, and I would have peace of mind if I accepted that there are some things that are beyond my control. I would not ask for help from some Supreme Being. For others, though, the experience strengthened or renewed their faith. They believe the second life they have now is a proof of God’s love and kindness. I won’t argue against that. I’m an atheist, but it does not mean that I’m anti-religion or I can’t stand people who wear their Jesus-loving hearts on their sleeves.

As I was writing the first paragraphs of this essay, at about five in the afternoon, another aftershock occurred. The aftershocks had decreased in frequency, from every ten minutes to every two hours, but this one felt like a separate earthquake than a mere aftershock. One of my roommates and I decided to leave the dorm and spend the night in some friends’ place, which had one floor only. Cracks had formed on the walls of our dorm, and though some inspectors came and certified the safety of the building, we would not be able to sleep for fear of another strong tremor.

I’m still shaken, and I’m trying to make sense of what I’m doing, why I’m writing this. Perhaps I’m trying to seek catharsis in writing. This is my way of coping with this traumatic experience. I should keep in mind that an earthquake is a natural occurrence. It has nothing to do with me. This is Mother Earth digesting her food or scratching her back, and I’m just a keratin or some insignificant cell in her body. After this terrifying episode, I have to keep on living. The world is not going to wait on me. I have work, family and personal responsibilities. Like all Filipinos in the face of natural, social and political tragedies, I must be resilient. I must be optimistic.