Tokyo Earthquake chaos: Gnarler speaks!

Japan: March 12 2011. Our own Gnarler (+ wife) is safe in Japan. I thought his description of what they experienced post earthquake, post-tsunami, was so amazing that (with his permission and minor editing by me) I’ve posted it here [OMC].

“Yeah today was an interesting day.

We were going to ‘secret shopper’ a Rosetta stone kiosk for M_’s prospective new job as a rosetta stone kiosk operator. He was on break when we got there, so we had some sushi and came back. As soon as we got there, I felt some small shaking and saw the guy. We both looked at each other, instead of saying Hi or something Rosetta stone, its like “Uh is that an earthquake?” Keep in mind this is on the 5th floor of a 12 floor building. Small shaking turned into medium shaking, and I got the mental command to book it. Once I noticed this was increasing I just decided to go outside. I went via escalator which was a bad idea because I almost got trampled by screaming people. As I went down each floor, the shaking got worse and worse, kicking in “event mode” in my head – like something is truly happening that is pretty huge. Once I got outside, the first thing I saw was a building under construction in the distance with 2 cranes on top. The cranes were swaying and banging into each other, the hanging hooks acting as wrecking balls. It was quite a sight. Things were falling off of roofs, gutters were crashing down into the people but no one got hurt near me. After I surfed the earth for quite some time, I kept watching those dueling cranes. Eventually my wife came out of the building. She believes to stay put in an earth quake instead of getting out… which might be smart or maybe not … but we both were safe. After that we went back in to finish the task and the mall announced they will close because here comes another quake. And another. And another…. smaller ones though. We get the message and walk to Harijuku park in a nice deep forest and we sit and play some paper and pencil games together. Another large series of quakes happened but this time it was fun because we were in a park and trees don’t care.

All the trains stopped working in Japan, The trains and the rails had to be visually inspected manually in order to re open. We had alot of time bouncing around from place to place, and all the places were closing early. We scoffed down some nice ramen noodles and the place closed after we got there. Then we wandered around and found a train station with wifi, but it closed once we got there. Then we wandered some more, found a cafe – but it closed once we got there. Iphone store – 30 minutes until it closed as well. I took a nap while M_ charged her phone – which wasnt working because everyone was spamming the cell phone towers.

Once the word that the train line den en toshi was going to open, that place got mobbed. hundreds of thousands of marooned people stuck in downtown for the days shopping had to get home and it was a trample mob scene. They cordoned off the entrance and let people in in spurts – and when the lines were down, it really really was a stampede. People were screaming they were scared. The trains were packed 100% every square inch had crammed flesh and people still took running dives to jam themselves in.

Most houses lost power – water – gas , but by now most of the utilities have been restored.

Over all just a train panic and a few toppled things from what I see, but the news has these huge fires and offices getting wrecked… For a Japan wide earthquake rumored to be 8000 times stronger then the christ church one, I think this nation took its licks like a champ. Cant blame the scared people, but the infrastructure remained stout. They seriously repaired all 3 services, as well as inch by inch inspection of at least the den en toshi lines in time for me to get back home safely.

At least I am allowed to sleep in this bed tonight. No gas – no hot shower so im steenky….. but that’s no real problem.”