'Ja hear about the earthquake?

Here's The Age's report of the earthquake that hit Japan early this morning. A rather amusing dramatisation of it all, given that the epicentre was in Suruga Bay, which little ol' Numazu sits on and meant that we were in the thick of the action, so to speak.



The circles in these maps represent earthquake measuring stations. Japan has a very informative way of measuring earthquakes; instead of using the Richter scale as a blanket measurement, they rate the quake according to how it is felt at all the different stations. Logically this means that the closer you are to the epicentre, the more intense the reading, although if you look at the maps you'll see that in practice it doesn't always work that way. In Numazu, we felt it as a 4. In Tokyo, which the article focuses on (because, of course, no-one's heard of any of the places that were really affected by the quake), it was felt as a 3 or 4, but the article reports it as a 6.5 because that was its highest reading in a few places that really aren't anywhere near Tokyo at all. Gotta love media sensationalism.

This link will give you a really interesting run-down of the effects of each rating, if you'd like to know what 4 actually means in real life. It shows you that 6.5 is serious stuff, so I'm not saying it wasn't a big quake. Just that the article tries to make it sound a lot worse.



And for the curious, Numazu is located just to the north and slightly west of Izu Peninsula, which is the arrowhead sticking out at the bottom right of this map.

As for our own experience of it, I happened to be awake at the time because Cassia had only a few minutes earlier woken and asked for something to eat. She was lying in bed between us when the rumbling and shaking started and the ceiling light swung back and forth. I could hear the unwashed dishes rattling around in the kitchen too. Craig woke and sat up very suddenly. I was scared for about three seconds when it wasn't clear whether the quake was going to get stronger or not, and worried that Cassia would get really scared too. But her reaction was no more than to keep munching on the piece of bread and exclaim "What's the light doing?" Later on I opened our kitchen cupboards and noticed a few spice jars teetering on the edge (note to self: after large earthquakes, do not open top cupboard suddenly), and I'm sure the fridge was closer to the wall than it usually is. But other than that, no damage sustained.

So there you go. I've now felt a real Japanese earthquake. It was an interesting reminder of the uncertainty of life, actually. I'll be glad if I don't stay here long enough to experience anything stronger than a 4. (Well OK, maybe I could take a 5 lower.)

Excitement plus!

Today we finally made a visit to a few stores I had been intending to check out one of these days, and they were better than I expected.

One was called Full House. I knew it sold second hand furniture but inspection of its insides today revealed that it's also a big op shop. Woohoo! An op shop in Numazu... my life is complete.

Another one was Hard Off and Off House combined. (There's an "Off" franchise for second-hand goods in Japan, including Book Off and some other kind of Off that I forget now.) It's a more upmarket "recycle superstore". This is the kind of place that has air conditioning, jingly music playing, wide aisles, bright lights and well-organised rows of merchandise. The quality of the items for sale is generally better, and occasionally the prices are not much lower than you'd get brand new. Still an exciting find, and a place I expect to check out again some time before we leave here.

The other very exciting place was a discount supermarket. Think Aldi. Here I can get cans of coconut milk for 88 yen (at Ito Yokado they cost about four times that), 10kg bags of rice for 2400 yen (about 25% cheaper than I've seen anywhere else), and... and... and baking soda. Now all I have to do is figure out how to use our oven and I can make banana muffins again. Woohoo!

***** ***** *****
Location of the discount supermarket and Hard Off/Off House: You know the road that runs parallel to the Gotemba train line between Ooka and Numazu, and how it curves around to run directly east-west through Numazu? (Sports Depo is on that road.) Well, they're all right near the curve in the road. The supermarket is a green building on the road, Hard Off and Off House are set back a little further.

Location of Full House: Oh man. It's too hard to explain. It's right up near the main highway through the northern part of Numazu, but I know that's not enough information to find it. Post me a comment and I'll show it to you on a map.

One year

We're officially half way through this gig. We arrived here one year ago today.

Here's what Craig and Cassia looked like:


And here's what I looked like:


A year later, Numazu hasn't changed in the slightest. But I suppose I must have, because it doesn't seem quite as bewildering or exhausting any more. When I step out the front entrance of our apartment building and look down the street to one of Numazu's larger intersections a couple of blocks away, I'm not disoriented. The Family Mart convenience store on the corner is familiar. The pedestrian overpass has been used many times. I know that if I take a right at that intersection, it will take me to many places I have been before and from which I can find my way back without a problem.

Looking over our north balcony, I see Ishibashi Plaza three blocks away. This is the main shopping centre I frequent at least twice a week. To think the first time I attempted to walk there I got lost and wound up in an industrial area! Inside Ishibashi Plaza is the fruit and veg market I buy my green groceries from (I haven't learnt its name) and Ito Yokado, the main supermarket and cheap department store in the same vein as Kmart or Target where I get my other groceries. In the last month I have finally learnt how to say that I don't have a Point Card and that I don't need another enviro-bag rebate card -- although I still don't know how to refuse plastic bags. Shopping is not so daunting or frustrating a task any more. I've learned where all "my" ingredients are, and have a pretty good idea of what I will and won't be able to find here. And all the rest can go hang. It's probably got pork or seafood in it anyway.

The day we arrived was hot and humid, and the cicadas were out in full force. When I awoke the next morning I immediately panicked that we had a gas leak in our kitchen; upon stepping outside for a moment I realised it was the buzzing of the cicadas. (We also don't have gas in this place -- everything's electric, but I didn't know that at the time.) I don't know if the little critters are louder this year than they were last year but I tell you what, if we really had a gas leak as loud as this in our apartment, we would have spontaneously combusted three weeks ago when one of our downstairs neighbours farted. But that's what disorientation will do to you, I guess. Everything seems louder, brighter, bigger and scarier than it really is.

There are many, many things about Numazu, and Japan in general I suspect, that still puzzle and annoy me. The way fire trucks go down our street at 10:30 p.m. with sirens blazing even though there's no traffic. The random announcements broadcast through the public speakers at 7:00 a.m. on a Sunday morning. Strangers good-naturedly giving Cassia junk food and useless little plastic toys. The rubbish disposal system. The bathroom sink, shower and kitchen plug holes which are designed to collect as much revolting slimy smelly gunk as possible and be very difficult to clean.

But I can survive. I've done my first year, it can only get better (or at least stay the same) for the second. And now I'll have a baby to help pass the time in 2010 too.

And to be fair, there are a few things I quite enjoy here. 100-yen stores. The fact that virtually everything's free for Cassia. The way people keep to the left on escalators at busy train stations. The extremely well organised and widespread public transport system. Not having/needing a car.

So, here's to another year in Numazu. May it fly.