Living Through an Earthquake Far from Home 🌏

It has been a month since August 10. The plastic sheet we tied over the hole in our roof is still up there, and thankfully it has held through every bout of rain so far.

In this blog, I'm sharing what it was like for me as an Indian to experience my first ever earthquake in Colombia, thousands of miles away from home.

The First Minute

I am from Tamil Nadu, India. We do not get earthquakes there, so I had never felt one in my life. Even the less intense ones I faced in the first months here in Colombia were nowhere close to what we felt last month.

At 7:30ish in the morning, the house started to move. I picked up my phone and started running out towards the door. Luisa came down from the third floor (second in India) to the first (ground in India) by the time I stood up and took 5 steps.

That's how sensitive she is to earthquakes, since she's experienced multiple smaller ones throughout her life + a huge one in '99 when she was barely a couple of weeks old.

I wasn't sensitive, but thankfully, I was only on the first floor. Within 10 seconds of us getting out, our house started falling apart. The roof and most of the third floor fell right in front of our eyes.

For most of it, my eyes were fixed on the ground because I couldn't bring myself to look at the destruction in front of me. 😓

Calling India

Within a few minutes, I called home. Fortunately, my mobile data was working. My parents didn't know anything about the incident, as it had only been a couple of minutes since the incident happened, and international news hadn't covered it yet.

The calming part of all of this is that my parents could see us on a video call, safe and sound. However, seeing the damage and hearing about the 7.4 magnitude definitely stirred fear in them. And no matter what, they don't overshare their fear, because I'll get worried. Same goes for me as well. I cannot say how scary things are here, because I could unnecessarily preoccupy them.

That is the hard part about living far from home. Your parents can hear your voice and see what's happening, but they still cannot come over to be there with us in person and know the full extent of anything, really.

Why Everyone Was Joking

A couple of weeks later, people around me started making jokes about the earthquake. I did not understand it at all. In my family, bad news makes the house go quiet.

Luisa explained that the laughing is how people here handle the fear. They joke to move on from the pain. I knew this before, but seeing it all happen in real time after such a devastating event truly surprised me.

Some days I laugh with them now. Other days I go quiet the way my family does, and Luisa understands well thanks to her experience of living in India for two years. 🦚

The Community

Our family and friends came over to help immediately. Our neighbors, whom we had only ever said hello to, spent whole days pulling rubble out of the house by hand.

People brought bricks to our house before we asked. Others sent food and groceries, and messages came in from countries we have never visited. Some of them came from people who only know us from YouTube, Instagram, or online (all of you).

I moved here for Luisa and left my whole family behind, and I used to wonder if I made the right call. This event gave me the answer, because a lot of people - who did not have to- showed up.

Asking for Help

This was the hardest part for me, harder than the shaking and harder than living without a roof.

Asking for monetary help for the reconstruction was incredibly hard. Heck, even creating a simple poster with images of the broken house and payment details took us days, because we couldn't bring ourselves to go through that process.

Once it was ready, we sat on it for days before we posted anything. Nobody treated us badly for asking, not a single person. I got that one wrong, and I am saying it here in case someone else is sitting on the same feeling. 🙏

Where We Are Now

We are still waiting for the government to get back to us about the reconstruction. Nothing can start until they give us permission to rebuild.

The plastic roof is holding. Everyone in our family is safe, and we know how lucky that makes us.

We recorded the whole conversation this month, and we said a few things on camera that we hadn't said to each other before.

You can watch it here.

YouTube:

Spotify:

If you made it till here, thank you for reading.

This has been one of the hardest experiences we have lived as a couple and as human beings, but we're also amazed by how much growth we can experience after something so painful.

We love you guys. See you soon! ❤️