The cooking challenge

One of my dearest friends injured her ribs, and was off work for a week.

Now, this chick is an absolutely gorgeous human being, and a foodie. After leaving her home—twice—with cuisine magazines I hatched a plan. In order to entertain and amuse her (and challenge me), I decided on a game! I would make a recipe out of one of those magazines every day for the remaining four days of the working week!

Day One: Brownie cake with boysenberries. Truly truly deeeelicious! Rather than burden my friend and her family with the task of eating all of it (and I hasten to point out here that I gave her only half the cake and kept the other half for my own family) I issued her with a challenge:  she had to make every person who visited her eat a piece!

Day two: and this was a massive undertaking, it was quince and roquefort frangipani tart. I have never eaten blue cheese in my life, indeed I phoned my friend and asked “Is Roquefort supposed to smell like that?” to which she replied “Yes.” Tart made, I took it round, and insisted she try it first as I had no idea how roquefort, quince, a pastry base with icing sugar in it, and frangipani was going to work. She loved it, so I tried some, and I have to admit folks, it works so utterly gorgeously because of the Roquefort!!! It was a smash hit!!! Since her lovely parents were there they helped us to eat some and (in continuance of the game) took two slices home, plus some brownie cake! I came home with a little under half of the remaining tart and my daughter and I finished it off.

           

Day three: by this time I knew that both I, and dearest friend, were concerned for our waistlines, and so I scoured the two magazines for the right recipe, and when I selected it I made it, took it round, raved about how long it had taken me, told her “You are going to love this!” Naturally she was fearing another extravagant and fattening dish…and so I removed the tinfoil cover to reveal: fruit kebabs with a lemon yoghurt dipping sauce!!! She laughed, with—I believe—both delight and relief!

Day four: still concerned at sending my friend’s scales—and my own—to new heights, I opted for a roasted tomato and labneh recipe. Basically, tomatoes with garlic, a drizzle of olive oil, and a sprinkle of smoked paprika and caster sugar, seasoned with salt and pepper, then roasted slowly. Once done, a scattering of sliced almonds, and dollops of labneh (greek yoghurt mixed with a tsp of sea salt and strained for 24 hours). Again, I sold her on the delightful dish, and then did the great reveal of something simple, healthy, and low calorie! However…she had phoned me up and give me a recipe, earlier in the week, for salted caramel, and so I am afraid I made that also, and to compensate for the healthy dish, I took some of the salted caramel as well.

Admittedly I have had a fun week, and probably could have done some more writing … but the wonderful thing for me, is that I feel a renewed enjoyment of cooking! I feel re-inspired!

It is so easy to get sick of cooking, and it is so easy to not make the time for another person. This week I have rediscovered the joy of cooking, and got to spend time with a person who is often out of the city with her job, and busy for most of the rest of the time. She is, as I said, a truly gorgeous human being, one who’s very presence lights up the lives of those around her.

It was a great week! When I saw her yesterday and she gave me another cuisine-type magazine I quickly asked “There’s no challenge with this one, is there?”, and her ‘No no no!” was uttered rather too quickly!!!

Life in Christchurch

As time rolls on, and it is now one month exactly after the earthquake which shook Christchurch to its knees, metaphorically and literally!

How does the recovery progress? Slowly. In every city there is the main central business district, the business hub of the city, along with shops, cafes, and restaurants of every description. Well, ours is now a disaster zone, yet even within that zone stand buildings that are perfectly fine, but cannot open for business because of all that is around them.

The work progressed in stages, first, the desperate search to find survivors, then the search to recover bodies, on to demolishing highly unstable and dangerous buildings. Amidst all that the desperate work to get electricity working again, water flowing, and sewerage systems working – all of which were seriously damaged in the earthquake.

What we face now is the possibility of more buildings that will need to be demolished, others that are repairable, and yet others that are at risk because of the neighbouring buildings. We have streets where the front/facades of the buildings/shops crumbled onto the footpath and road. We have hills where one house may collapse onto the one below, which may in turn collapse onto the one below.

Our CBD is littered with mounds of rubble, and severely damaged buildings.

Some of our suburbs look like a Salvador Dali painting, with not a single building completely upright or undamaged.

Some of our suburbs look like the beach came to town.

Many roads stretched and pulled apart.

As a fairly good guess, I would have to say that there is not a single street in Christchurch that is a level as it used to be. You drive not just watching traffic but watching to see the state of the road ahead of you.

The physical recovery of our city is going to be a very long term recovery. What is unrepairable needs to be demolished. What is repairable needs to be repaired. Collapsed buildings, demolished buildings, piles of rubble, all need to be cleared away. But there are only so many people, and there are only so many hours in a day…and it is going to take a long time…a long long time.

The questions we ask are:

Will there be anything left in the CBD at all?

Will the damaged suburbs be complete wastelands?

We ask these questions of ourselves, inwardly, because no one can answer. We don’t know how long anything will take. We still have suburbs with no working sewerage systems, and no running water.

And so we do the only thing we can do, we keep breathing, and we keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Life here is not the same as it was, we think differently, we are ready to flee in a single moment, and we live at a very heightened level. But, the wonderful thing has been the spirit of humanity, that wonderful community spirit that has risen amongst us. Let that continue.

We are in this together. And we will continue to support each other to the best of our ability in whatever ways we can. We all have strengths, we all have something to share, we all have skills to offer.

In the most painful of days, a simple smile can be the light that lifts the world.

There are words that have come to mean a lot over the last month in Christchurch, and they are:

RISE UP CHRISTCHURCH

and

KIA KAHA  (be strong)

To all of my fellow Cantabrians…Kia Kaha

Arohanui

Robyn

The Japanese disaster

How does one even begin to fathom the crisis in Japan? It’s almost beyond comprehension.

Here, in Christchurch, NZ, faced an earthquake and the destruction that it unleashed on us, and perhaps as many as 200 people have died. It was devastating, and left our central business district in ruins, likely closed until Christmas time. It left businesses in the CBD scrambling to try to find office space, houses, anywhere that they could work from. It left people’s homes damaged or destroyed. It cut off power, water, sewerage systems. Liquifaction wreaked havoc across the city. Roads and bridges buckled – I would say there is no street in ChCh that is as level as it once was. Schools have been damaged and some well beyond hope of repair, and we now have other schools doubling up and running morning school for one school and afternoon school for another school. Our historic Arts Centre (the original university of Christchurch) has had all but one building red stickered (too dangerous to enter!), and will cost over $100,000 to repair (it will be repaired because it is an important part of our city). Our iconic Cathedral in the Square is badly damaged. The list goes on…

But we did not face a tsunami. We did not have the horrific power of a massive wave wash our city away. We did not witness cars and shipping containers being swirled around in the water as if they were children’s toys. We did not come back to witness massive piles of splinter wood where houses used to be, ships on top of buildings, cars on top of office blocks, bodies along the shore. And we did not face the potential of a nuclear disaster.

So, for all that we went through, we are so very lucky. And for all that the people of Japan have been through and are still going through…I cannot even comprehend how you must be feeling, but my love, my strength, my support, and my comfort flow out to you.

Whatever we face, there may be others who face worse. Whatever our pain, there may be others in more pain. Whatever our loss, there may be others who have lost more. And so we find the strength to go on, to keep placing one foot in front of the other, to keep taking one breath after another.

What Japan faced is horrific, and yet it is so far away we cannot really understand. What we have faced her in Christchurch … a 7.1 magnitude earthquake, 10 kilometres deep, 40 kilometres from the city centre, on 4^th Sep (4.35 a.m.), and five and a half months later, on the 22^nd Feb (10.51 a.m.), a devastating 6.3 magnitude earthquake, five kilometres deep and five kilometres from the city centre … this for us is real, raw, and we felt it to our very bones. This we fully comprehend. The destruction, we felt it as it happened, and we knew out city was being shaken to its knees, again, and we knew that this time people were dying. Yet, again, I cannot even comprehend what the people of Japan are facing, as we seem such a small scale disaster compared to Japan.

So what can we all do? We  an be kind to one another. We can send out love, our strength, our comfort, and healing, our light, and our prayers to all of the people of Japan and to the land herself. It may not feel like much…but it is something.

Let’s all do something.

Coping after the earthquake...

We needed some groceries items (milk, bread, fruit) and when I called in to our local small supermarket the car park was full. Heading for the next supermarket I decided I would park in the open car park and not the underground one where I normally preferred to park. However, when I got there all the outdoor car parks were taken, and I was forced to make a decision: abandon the shopping, or park in the car park under the building. Normally this would not be a decision to even ponder, but this time, I twinge of anxiety ran through me, and I actually prayed as I pulled under the building and parked my car—and yes there were many car parks available here. There were to be no earthquakes or aftershocks while I was in that building! And I sent a text to my children to let them know where I was—just in case something happened.

             

 Yes, that is what we are living with!

I could not possibly have done the shopping any faster, and even on my way back to the car I said another prayer, as visions of the entire building collapsing on me ran through my mind! It was a relief to be out of there and on my way home.

             

Today, my son and I had to go to Bunnings to get some supplies so that the laundry paintjob could be completed—it was started back in January. Here, again I just wanted to get in and out as quickly as possible. My daughter was home and I did not want to be away for long. I will point out here that my son is 21 and my daughter is 19, so they are not toddlers!!           

This has truly highlighted to me the state of worry and anxiety that so many of us are living in.

             

At night I make sure my daughter knows where the torch is, where the jacket is, so that if she has to run out the door she can grab her jacket on the way. The door is only locked at the top lock so that she can open the door easily. Forget chub locks, as just try getting a key into a keyhole in the middle of an Earthquake when everything is shaking like crazy. Son would head out the front door, and the car keys are in the door, so he can unlock, grab and run!

             

Torches have to be readily accessible at night. Last thing before I go to bed, I make sure the bottles of boiled water are all filled, and put one last jug of water on to boil.

             

We are not living as we used to. We are living in a state of preparedness, ready to do what we need to do as soon as we need to do it.

             

Our lives have changed.

             

With time things will settle, anxieties will ease, fears will diminish. 

             

Until then can I just say this, to all my family and friends: you mean everything to me.

Destruction, death, chaos, anxiety, and worry

What is going to happen next? If this is the ‘one magnitude less’ aftershock that we were told to expect after the Sep 4^th 7.1 magnitude earthquake, then (even though this one was 6.3 not 6.1) perhaps that entire saga is coming to an end? Perhaps that era of our history/present is winding down?

As time passed we did not think the ‘one magnitude less’ would happen, after all five and a half months had passed, and to be honest, many of us probably thought it would come from the same location. Instead it hit hard, and in a different location, right under Lyttelton Harbour, a quarter of the distance away from the Sep quake and half the depth. We got pummelled, there’s no other way to describe it!

We did not expect something so massive and destructive. We considered the September quake and thought that a 6.1 from the same location would not be too destructive, so we thought we—and our city—would all be okay. We did not expect what happened.

The clean up is massive. Liquifaction brought sand/silt to the surface in many places, and if you did not know any better you would wonder why we built on beaches…but these places are nowhere near a beach! They are inland. Then there is the destruction of houses, homes that are torn apart, split in half, wrecked beyond comprehension. The buildings in the city and in Lyttelton, are (to use a very technical term) munted! The CBD (central business district) is going to lose many more buildings as the badly damaged are brought down. There is talk that entire blocks of buildings will have to be demolished. We still do not know if the 22 storey high Grand Chancellor Hotel is going to fall down in a decent aftershock, or whether a controlled demolition will have to take place. None of us want that aftershock, but we also want that building down so that no one is endangered any longer.

Our central business district will never be the same again, but I hope that when it is rebuilt it will be better, more beautiful, more resilient, built upon the combined hopes and love of a city’s people. We have a chance to make a clean start in the CBD. And we have to have a monument or art work somewhere that will forever remind us of the people who died in this disaster. Let us always honour them, and acknowledge that they walked here and were loved.

 As time passes people are going to get upset that things have not miraculously been fixed, that the sewerage system is not already fixed, that their houses are not fixed, that the CBD is still a mess …that nothing is happening fast enough for their liking. But let us all be patient and understand that things take time. Let us find the joy in the simplest of things, and just keep moving forward with love, compassion and patience.

In our fair city I ask this: let there be no room for anger in your heart, no room for frustration, no room for impatience, and not a single thought of uttering a harsh word.

Let kindness be the ‘way’ you live.

What is going to happen next is, to a degree, in our hands, in our hearts and in our thoughts.

We are a city that has been ravaged by the power of this earthquake…and we will honour those who died by building a better city, and being a better people. And we will treat our land with far greater respect and appreciation.

Christchurch earthquake

Where do I even begin to explain what it has been like to live through ANOTHER massive earthquake in Christchurch?

I will begin by telling you that we are now living with a high degree of anxiety and fear. After two massive earthquakes in 5 months, we can no longer expect to not get another massive one, so each time there is a shake, we go into flight mode, ready to run, leap under tables, escape buildings. Big aftershocks will cause further damage, as many buildings and houses are precarious.

When this big earthquake hit, on 22 February, most of us probably thought it was a small jolty aftershock when it began, but it got stronger and stronger and didn’t stop. In my own house, crystals were falling, lamps falling, stereo speakers fell over, pot plants fell, books, ornaments, and all sorts of stuff in the kitchen. Thankfully after the Sep 4^th quake we had already fastened bookshelves and wall units to the walls. I was home with my daughter and as soon as the shaking eased I ran (as best as one could in a still shaking house), grabbed her and we just held on to each other as a big aftershock belted through. We were freaked, but we were okay, and the house was still standing.

Now began the desperate task of trying to get in touch with my son who had been at university when it hit, my husband who works in the central business district, and my elderly father. Lines were overloaded, cell phones weren’t working, and desperation was setting in across the city. My sister reached me to tell me my son had gone straight round to our father’s flat and they were both okay. My husband ran home from the city centre! (It was much faster than trying to drive).

Our concrete block  fence was on a dangerous lean and firemen have since pushed it over. Our chimney is not looking too good, so they roped off the area where it is likely to fall.

As a city…we are devastated, and heart broken. There is a sense of disbelief. We are not back to the way things were after the Sep 4^th quake, we are in a much much worse situation. Over 100 people are declared dead, and over 200 still missing. We are looking at a death toll that may be near, or over, 300. Buildings can be replaced…people’s mothers, fathers, daughters, sons, husbands, and wives cannot. To see a picture of these people in their grief is utterly heartbreaking, and I feel it so deeply for them.

The central business district is a disaster zone. The 22 story Grand Chancellor Hotel is in a dangerous state and will fall in a serious aftershock, or have to be brought down. When it comes down it is going to domino its neighbours. Buildings have collapsed, facades have fallen down and crushed passersby. This quake hit just before 1 o’clock, when people were out for lunch.

Areas of Christchurch will have no water, power or sewerage system for possibly 2-3 weeks. The sewer system is seriously ‘munted’ right across the city. The water system is badly damaged and contaminated. The power company is working hard to get power on to everyone, and will be putting in power-poles  and overhead lines in some places as it is the quickest way to get power to people.

I cannot even express to you how unbelievable all of this feels. We see it on television and in movies. We don’t expect it to happen to us…we don’t expect it to happen to us twice.


(www.robynmspeed.com)

Christchurch Earthquake 22nd Feb 2011

A brief update on our personal situation...

On 4th Sep Christchurch was hit by a 7.1 magnitude Earthquake. Yesterday we were hit by a 6.3 magnitude Earthquake. This one was 5 kilometres away and 5 kilometres deep...thus the destruction has been violent and massive.

Our central business district is a disaster zone, a stage of emergency has been declared.

In our own home we have suffered only mildly. This crack up the chimney as it was after the first hit yesterday, and then after the second big aftershock. The chimney will at some point need to come down, but at this stage it is not a danger unless we get massive aftershocks. The fire dept are under such pressure that we can surely only demand the most urgent work from them.

Another big aftershock and the chimney may come down and take part of the roof and front of the house with it. We have our fingers crossed. This movement has caused minor interior damage, but it is purely cosmetic (as far as we know!)




 
 





Our front fence, which withstood the Sep 4th just fine, was on a lean after the first one yesterday, and then, if you look at the following one you will see the lean after the next big aftershock, and the final picture....well that's after the fire dept guys pushed it down.

 My young uns and our badly leaning fence. And, my first ever graffiti .... I know which I'd written a poem or something motivational!

After a few good firemen, its down.














The following one is our newly fenceless front yard and roped off danger area. We are exposed to the street now, but it's a very open look...and I think it works!