In (virtual) conversation with Mademoiselle - from earthquake to Covid.
- Stephne Hope
- Apr 9, 2021
- 5 min read
I started a conversation with a lady with the intention of learning about her experiences during the Covid-19 pandemic. Soon I realised that she had a much more interesting life experience to talk about. You might think it has nothing to do with surviving Covid… yet surviving is the key word in this story. This is a retelling of her experience…
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I grew up in France with my mum, dad and younger brother. After completing my education, I managed to get an internship in Tokyo with the help of a classmate and jumped at this wonderful opportunity. At the end of the internship, I was offered a job and was really happy to keep in working for them.
Living and working in a new country has taught me many things about life and also about being grateful for the little things in life. This particular Friday has shown me how much more there is about humanity, connection and strength than ever before. I am not talking about just any old Friday at work, but March 11th, 2011. Do you remember that day? That was the day that one of the biggest recorded earthquakes struck. It started at 2:46pm. It was the 2011 Miyagi earthquake, or often referred to in Japan as the Great East Japan earthquake. I have experienced earthquakes there before, but this one was different – it seemed a lifetime before the earth stopped shaking. I was thinking, “Oh my God, is it the end of the world?” Once we felt safe to get up from under our workstations, I phoned my mum straight away. I was so happy, because I could get through to her, but unfortunately as I said, ‘Hello mum…’, the phone lines went down. My mother told me afterwards that was one of the worst moments in her life; when they found out on the news what happened, as she thought that I phoned to say goodbye…
Key Facts about the earthquake:
Local date
11 March 2011
Local time
14:46 JST
Duration
6 minutes
Magnitude
9.0–9.1 (Mw)
Depth
29 km (18 mi)
Type
Megathrust
Areas affected
Japan (shaking, tsunami) Pacific Rim (tsunami)
Total damage
$360 billion USD
Max. intensity
IX (Violent)
Peak acceleration
2.99 g
Peak velocity
117.41 cm/s
Tsunami
Up to 40.5 m (133 ft) in Miyako, Iwate, Tōhoku
Landslides
Yes
Foreshocks
Aftershocks
13,386 (as of 6 March 2018)
Casualties
15,899 deaths +2 (Overseas), 6,157 injured, 2,529 people missing
Normally I would take the train home which only takes about 20 minutes, but I had to walk home, which took me over 4 hours. I just wanted to get home and off the street, as all I could hear were sirens of fire trucks and emergency services. It was madness.
I got home to a mess, with all my furniture all over the place. But a moment of relief came when I was able to start up my computer and email my dad to say that I was OK. Being able to use the internet was like someone giving me a lifeline.
The next day I heard about the explosion at the Fukushima Daini Nuclear Power Plant due to the tsunami that struck. The place where I lived then had food shortages and also toilet paper shortages (she laughed as she remembered the toilet paper situation during the first lockdown here in the UK). For me I imagined that must be how it is in war. I was thinking that maybe I need to evacuate the country and go to my parents in France. This sounds crazy, but on the Monday, I really wanted to go back to work, just to see familiar faces around me. I felt so uncertain and unsure what to do. The next couple of days were really hard to sleep or even get back to some kind of normality, as the earth kept shaking every 2 hours from the aftershock.
On the Tuesday, there was a fourth explosion. I kept on checking the news to decide what to do. It was really confusing, because the information from the news, the embassy and what I read on the internet was not always the same. After I read that there was toxic gas released and on its way in the next 10 hours towards where I lived, I decided to head towards the airport. My work manager was really supportive of my decision to leave the country and said that I can work from my parents’ home in France, but I also had to be mindful not to distress my colleagues.
The airport looked like a refugee camp. There were people everywhere! People were camping out inside the airport until they were able to get on the next available flight to go wherever they had family who could take them in. We were so lucky that the airport was not destroyed or affected by the destruction of the earthquake. ‘Crazy times!’
I was so relieved when my parents picked me up from the airport. I stayed in France for one month and returned back to after things went back so some sort of normality.
It was great to see how the government was trying to rebuild the infrastructure for the communities that were effected the most. A lot of people were suspicious of the quality of the water and also to purchase certain food produce, because of possible contamination. I only ate cucumber again when I moved to London.
Advice I would give my younger self would be: ‘Don’t worry, everything will be OK, even when you go through severe uncertainty. Be grateful for what you have and the people around you. Make time you have with them count.'
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So, how does this relate to her experience with Covid-19? She said that now she always makes sure that she has emergency funds in case she needs to take a last minute flight somewhere, and she always has an emergency survival pack at home. At the start of the pandemic, sadly five precious members from her family and people with close connection to her family had passed away within a very short period of 8 weeks. She has witnessed death and destruction on so many levels in her life. What encouraged me tremendously during my conversation with her, is how she decided to use her own experiences of difficult times to help and strengthen others. It is easy to feel angry about all the madness in life, but she used these experiences to make her stronger.
She can now, with confidence, say that she survived a massive earthquake and also a world pandemic. She is still positive and working towards a brighter future for herself and those around her. Through our conversation I realised that I should be focusing more on the positives around me and cling on to the things that makes me feel most alive. Nothing can replace our precious family and friends.
If you have a life event, or an experience since the first lockdown due to the pandemic you would like to share, please let us know. You can either subscribe to the blog, or you can message us through Instagram @Isolated_butnotalone
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If you feel under tremendous stress or worry about a life event, please do not try and work through this alone. There are people willing and trained to help! Here is a link that will point you in the right direction.
Quote from the nhs.uk/mental-health: “Most people feel stressed sometimes and some people find stress helpful or even motivating. But if stress is affecting your life, there are things you can try that may help. Support is also available if you're finding it hard to cope with stress.”
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