A LETTER FROM CHRISTCHURCH

Today, I received the following letter from friend and colleague: Diederik van Heyningen, who is a Christchurch based advertising photographer. It has been very difficult for many of us who are not in Christchurch to grasp the daily reality of the situation, but his letter paints a vivid, and immediate picture. I asked if I could reproduce it; so with Diederik’s permission we are sharing it here (unedited).

Adam Custins

“Hi guys,
This email from us here in chch is a general update going out to all friends and family who made contact with us last week….
First of all, I’d like to apologize for my short txt replies, quick one line emails and for my ‘shortness’ on the phone for those who rang over the few days after the earthquake….there was a bit going on at the time to say the least.
Secondly I have to say that words cannot express how amazing it was to receive all your messages of strength and support and offers of help so quickly and from so far away at times even. It is such an amazing feeling having you all behind us, it gave us much needed ‘strength’ to push through when sleep was hard to come by, stress levels were fueled by half hourly adrenal rushes (aftershocks) and patience with ‘anything’ was wearing very very thin.
The whole thing was bit of a mind scramble for a while to say the least. so much goes through your mind, constantly trying to assess situations, always at the ready to flee, to take cover, to look for potential dangerous situations…will that block wall nex to the garage fall on me when I try to get in the car, will it squash my car if a quake hits at night, will I leave my car on the road overnight from now on instead, will it get burgled there by opportunists if I leave it out, will it sink into a hole underground I can’t see due to liquifaction under the drive way, have I got enough fuel to get us out of here if another big one hits, have I got enough food and water in the car to last us a few days in case we get stuck etc etc. every day constantly analyzing each and every thing you do…. you can’t even drive down the road normally..any road you drive down you need to look for unmarked pot holes, unmarked bumps….. if another quake hits, what can fall over and how far will it cover the road or my car even.in debris, what about those over head power lines and those power poles on the side of the road, will they be live still what will I do, how will they fall, in which direction, how would I get home from here quickest etc etc
After the quake we were all over the place and all had different priorities and views on things…Sandy just wanted to clean and vacuum the house and have it all tidy again, I just wanted to know I had supplies to last us and and several escape routes in case we needed one. I needed to figure out what this all meant long terms so I could take appropriate action, Sandy just wanted to get out of town so we could get a decent night sleep. I just wanted to get on with it and get stuck in. The kids just wanted to get back to school and pick up their stuff that they left there in a hurry. It’s still hard to describe in an email the differences in thinking about what priorities are and why…. easier verbally…next time we catch up.

I was driving along Durham street with Chris. We were about to go look at a real bargain 2nd hand Bose unit for the studio downstairs. The unit was salvaged out of a tourist operation during their upgrade renovations. It was a bit older but apparently was heavy duty commercial grade unit with great sound…… We had iphone plot a route for us (I never use it in chch, but had never been to this street before so though I’d give it a try) but last second while driving we decided iphone had no idea what the quickest way was and Chris suggested we’d just go straight down Durham street and left onto Moorhouse which seemed logical to me too and so we did…. I had missed the first turn (on ipod’s suggestd route) anyway and was going to drive through town to ‘cut off the route’ and join up across town again….. going straight down Durham street seemed much more logical. Good thing we didn’t cut through town looking back!!
So we were driving down Durham street about level with St John just across St Asaph street when all of a sudden it felt like I had ‘four flat tires’ …. the truck was ‘all over the road’…it took a split second to realize just what was going on and hit the brakes (in a controlled way I might add) while watching no one was going to rear end us! Up ahead the road and Durham over bridge were twisting and turning like a roller coaster with lamp posts swaying violently left and right (amazing they never snapped off at the base!) and buildings moving around like you’d only see in a cartoon. Then I checked in my rear view mirror again to make sure no one was going to smash into us and I saw a building smashed across the road behind us in a massive cloud of dust…..I knew then ‘This was big’! The quake came through in waves and seemed to last all of 10-15 seconds. When it settled we started driving again and opted to head straight back to the studio and to drop chris off and drive straight home to pick up kids from school and wait for Sandy to come back from her bike ride that I was sure she was on. It took me an hour and half to cover the same distance that normally takes 3-4 minutes. The roads were instantly filled with cars bikes and pedestrians all trying to avoid the cracks in the roads that were opening up wider and wider with each after shock…as well as the ruble from fallen buildings and walls etc. Alex was in the studio and luckily was ok. He locked up and ran home after I told him traffic and ruble had ‘grid locked’ the city streets.
What a mess!
Trafic was remarkably organized and polite from my experience….I can only imagine what it would have been like if this had been the first earth quake, it would have been absolute madness!!!
There were people everywhere and ruble everywhere. Some people crying others running, some covered in dust some bleeding….they were some of the lucky ones. At one stage I saw a man carrying a little girl with no life in her little body. Arms and legs dangling over his arms. She was covered in dust her face and limbs white as a sheet. His face looked numb from shock, walking seemed pure reflex, one foot after another…he was heading towards the hospital with five or six people semi jogging behind him, he stoped every now and then to look at her and to catch his breath….so sad.

Sandy was not on her bike ride (I thought she’d be around the back of the airport by then) and had the kids safely at home by the time I got there. It had taken me so long to get there that they were starting to get really worried. I didn’t realize it took me 1.5 hrs to get home!! Kids were naturally shaken up pretty badly, but I am very proud of the way they pulled through it all and still to date the way they are coping. Sandy too is holding up real good and trucks on like nobodies business…..AND she puts up with me…..I’m one lucky dude 🙂

So…. we’re pretty much screwed for quite some time I think.
Despite the fact that we are lucky in a lot of ways. The house we are renting is still standing and quite livable despite no water and no sewage/waste. The other three town houses less than 10m away from ours (shared drive way) are written off and need to come down. Our garage has been shunted side ways by 15cm yet a now free standing brick wall that was connected to the garage has remained in it’s original place but sheared off the garage… Our house has moved the same distance but in another direction, Cracks run straight through gardens, sealed driveways, entire garage and house foundations and walls…yet our place is relatively in tact by comparison. Liqufaction everywhere…I’ve busted my back shoveling the fine sand away from where it drowned part of our drive way and courtyard in a 20cm thick layer of very fine and sticky sand..more than 70-80 wheelbarrows full, I lost count 😉
And of course where this stuff has come out of the ground, there is now a void of sorts, some big some small, some deep some shallow. One of our neighbours houses has sunk a good 30cm at one end and actually risen at the other. But as you have seen on TV this is nothing compared to others…. mostly in the eastern suburbs. We live 1km from CBD, 1.5km from the studio within the CBD. The further out we go the less mess there is, quite surreal!
I should point out that last time the media did a great job focusing on those parts of the city which were ‘dramatically’ damaged and made it look like chch was a complete disaster zone. For sure it was a mess, but nothing like it is now. This really is quite a desperate situation in many ways for many people.
Unlike last time this quake seems to have had minimal impact in some of the suburbs that were hit quite bad last time and in completely wrecked others..streets at a time. Liquifaction has always been a danger in chch and this time it really has munted both the water and the sewage system quite nicely in a lot of areas. It is going to be months before this is up and running again..in fact some streets were still without sewage from the first quake six months ago.

Economically I’m very concerned for a lot of people…including us. if 50% of buildings in CBD either are down, or have to come down or cannot currently be worked in, then ……bugger me…MONSTER aftershock just now! As I was saying, if 50% of buildings are ‘out of action’ in CBD and if another third of houses and toast then that really leaves a lot of people without jobs, without homes, without businesses etc etc.
No one will be in much of a position to buy much so shops and other businesses really have no customers.
If there are no shops and businesses left to lease buildings then who is going to take the risk and build buildings hoping to tenant them etc etc
Bit of a viscious circle you might say.
But then again only time will tell 🙂
We have quite firmly decided to stay put and work through it all. Easy as it would be to up and leave, we wouldn’t be helping anyone but ourselves.
We will stay here and rebuild our business, keeping Chris and Alex employed and able to pay their mortgages at least. Longer term, and assuming we can keep LWP going we have offered space and facilities to other photographers so they can keep their business going too…. our little bit to help keep chch get back on it’s feet.

All in all, time will tell 🙂

Sorry this is all a bit disjointed and not very cohesive, as the days go by my little brain gets more and more clarity…. a bit like dust settling I guess…

I’ll stay in touch.

Thanks again for all your nice words and offers of help everyone!

Diederik, Sandy Anneke and Miciel.”

Diederik van Heyningen
diederik@lightworkx.co.nz
www.lightworkx.co.nz