23.10.04

Slightly Shaken

We were just watching TV when everything started swaying--the house plants, the fish tank, the apartment. My husband thought I was fidgeting and making the couch jiggle--gee, thanks, honey. It wasn't such a large earthquake in Tokyo, about 4 on the rector scale. But the entire country was shaken up, and in the Niigata area not that far away, the tremors registered at 6.8. According to the news, it's difficult to even stand in anything higher than a 6.

I couldn't help noticing that throughout the quake as well as the aftershocks, my dog Edward remained sweetly slumbering at our feet. I thought animals were supposed to be highly sensitive to these sorts of things?


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5 Comments:

Libby slept through the whole thing, having been tired out by two lapse around Yoyogi park and some frisbee playing afterwards.

But they say domesticated animals have lost whatever instinct they had in the wild to keep them away from danger. 

- Lynn

10/25/2004 03:19:00 PM  

Babies, like domesticated animals, obviously have no instinct about danger either. Sara just gnawed on my knuckle through the whole event (relief for painful gums rather than any hidden anxiety). 

- Hsin

10/25/2004 10:00:00 PM  

Lynn, that is sad.
I do really worry about Edward should a big earthquake hit. He has zero survival instincts. And would probably ignore my frantic calls to "come."

Hsin-Li, it is quite hilarious how many parallels you seem to find between dogs and babies. Could this be the potential of a bestseller? Can't you see it: Dogs Are from Venus, and So Are Your Children.  

- Rachel

10/25/2004 11:51:00 PM  

I think I would have slept through the earthquake too. When I sleep, I am like a rock... I think that could be a little dangerous. 

- Mimi

10/26/2004 03:26:00 AM  

Mimi? Is that you, as in Mimi-in-Ecuador Mimi? If not, I heartily appologize for confusing the hell out of you.

But if you are: hi! (Of course "hi" even if you are not Mimi-in-Ecuador!).

That reminds me though, did you all know that the earthquakes in the kansai region move in an up-and-down motion but earthquakes around the Tokyo area slide side to side, which is why they don't feel so extreme--of course that is partially because they haven't yet been that extreme.

When I was staying in the town of Okazaki, near Nagoya, my very first night I was literally jolted awake by what felt like the house jumping straight up in the air. It wasn't a huge earthquake but I remember my stomach feeling just as it does when a rollercoaster first plunges steeply downward. Definitely more extreme. And also dangerous.  

- Rachel

10/26/2004 04:11:00 AM  

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