I Felt the Earth Move

Many thanks to everyone who has written or called – yes, I’m perfectly safe. If you haven’t heard, there was an earthquake in Rwanda this weekend. Unfortunately, 38 people were killed, most in a collapse of a church where services were being held. And hundreds were killed in Congo. The quake was centered near Cyangugu, which is in the SW corner of the country – but it’s a small enough country that the vibrations were felt all the way in Kigali.

I was actually in Ghana when it struck, but tonight I was in the office late, when my officemate said, “That’s weird” and I said – “What’s weird?” As soon as I’d finished closing my mouth, I felt all wobbly, and thought my chair was shaking. I stood up and realized the floor and indeed the whole building were shaking too. I don’t mean to overdramatize – I mean, nothing was falling off the shelves, but it was definitely too much for comfort. My officemate and I ran into the doorway to be safe, and the other coworker still in the building came running in to see if we’d felt it too – but it was obvious that we had when she found us huddled under the door frame. We briefly considered going outside – we are a few floors up, and the buildings here certainly aren’t constructed with earthquakes in mind and thus collapses pose the biggest threats in situations like this. However, it was pouring outside, and the shaking was soon over. But we didn’t stick around very long, that’s for sure.

Now, I don’t have an internal Richter scale, but I’m guessing it was only a small aftershock. Can’t say I wasn’t shaken up though!