The Role of Sport for a Disaster Zone

One of the most inspiring stories from last year was the Superbowl victory for the New Orleans Saints. Unless you were under a rock for the last few years, practically everyone on the planet within earshot of a radio would have been aware of the devastation wrought on New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina. There was a quote from Drew Brees, the New Orleans quarterback. "We just believed in ourselves and we knew that we had an entire city and maybe an entire country behind us," said Brees, the game's MVP. "What can I say? I tried to imagine what this moment would be like for a long time, and it's better than expected." Try the entire world behind you Drew. Not only were the Saints the underdogs, but many people around the world wanted something special for residents of New Orleans.

Remember the Rugby World Cup in 1995. The All Blacks ruled supreme for the initial parts of the tournament but came unstuck in the final against the hosts. Now it could be argued that food poisoning had its role, but that would be insulting to the host nation, who played like it wasn't just a rugby game, but a symbol of the new South Africa. A nation prepared to embrace all of its citizens. In truth, though it hurt as a New Zealander, it was far more important for South Africa as a nation to win and to show the world, Francois Pienaar holding aloft the trophy with a jubilant Nelson Mandela applauding in the background. In New Zealand, it would have just been an empty cup, to quote Doc Hudson.

So exactly five weeks on from the Christchurch earthquake, Canterbury people have something to look at and cheer for. Although they haven't played in Christchurch yet, or will for the remainder of the season, the Crusaders are putting a big smile on our faces. Not only are they winning, they are winning in style. There is even talk of them being the greatest Super Rugby side ever. They have just played the Sharks in London and have been exciting not only the home fans, but the expat population and even the Northern Hemisphere media.

Add to that the Black Caps bundling out the Cricket World Cup favourites unexpectedly and now through to the semi finals where they play Sri Lanka tonight, then you can have many things to smile about. Especially as they have been written off already by Cricinfo. They have already done better than expected and anything more they do will be awesome.

So how does having a winning team help people in a disaster zone? It's not going to help people build homes or save businesses. It's not going to help rebuild infrastructure or even more poignantly, bring back loved ones. But it will provide a distraction and a happy one at that. And even though many Christchurch people will not see the Crusaders play this year, they will provide a boost to morale, which is extremely low at the moment. So while we grapple with what has become our new normal, we can pause and appreciate that our team is doing its part in our regions recovery. That is inspiring for us all.

Is it Time to Bring Back the Ministry of Works?

Alice in Videoland is one of the most beloved of all central Christchurch businesses. The reasons are pretty clear once you get there. It's a world class collection of movies that is available to all members. It would easily be the best video store in New Zealand if not Australasia. In fact it would be hard to find a better video store anywhere. Last year I embarked on an epic journey of trying to watch a classic movie per week from Alice's. I generally seemed to stick to Kurosawa movies, but even though I fell into the trap of sticking to a genre I liked, there were heaps of Kurosawa movies to choose from week after week.

One of the frustrating things for the movie lovers of Christchurch at the moment, is it looks like all the Alice's staff have to do, is pick up the DVD's off the floor and put them back on the shelf. They could then carry on trading. The problem is many buildings around that area have been destroyed and it is in the cordon zone. However, the building Alice's is in, looks completely unscathed.

Part of the reason may be that Alice's building used to be the High Street Post Office and it was built following the Napier earthquake by the Ministry of Works. The Ministry of Works had a high reputation for not only having world class engineers as staff, but also for over-engineering their projects so they didn't only meet the building codes of the time, but met the standards set by the Ministry of Works. Many projects done by the Ministry of Works have been true engineering wonders.

The Ministry of Works still exists in some form as Works Infrastructure. The MOW was split apart with some becoming Works Infrastructure and the rest going to Opus. So now Works Infrastructure competes on the open market for projects. And there will be compromises that have to be made on the open market.

My own earthquake experience in a Ministry of Works built building has given me food for thought. With so much reconstruction needed, shouldn't we employ the best? And if that is the case, shouldn't we be the best again? No privately run company could possibly carry out the scale of reconstruction needed in Christchurch at the moment so why not have a Ministry of Works who get a similar budget to roading to carry out much of this work. Then in 80 to 100 years when Christchurch next has an earthquake there will be a lot more buildings standing intact around the Alice in Videoland building. And that generation of people will be grateful for the Ministry of Works.

Earthquakes both here and abroad

Dr Mark Quigley may be the most respected New Zealander in the country at the moment. As a nation, we tend to like the no bullshit, matter-of-fact type characters that don't pull the wool over our eyes. That could explain why Willie Apiata consistently appears at the top of the most respected New Zealander list despite the fact that he is in the SAS and is supposed to be on secret missions.

Many Cantabrian's have found solace in Mark's easy to understand explanations of what has happened and have appreciated his no bullshit approach. His public lectures could have made him a rich man and instead of having curtain raisers at the rugby, the Canterbury Rugby Union could have used him to deliver one of his lectures. Could have boosted ticket sales.

We all knew that the news of 22 February would be tomorrows fish and chip paper, but who knew what would happen in Japan? With everything so raw for us, all of a sudden a country that New Zealand has quite a close relationship, suffers an unimaginable catastrophe. All the more considering the Japanese search and rescue teams worked so hard while here and the huge Japanese media interest in the 22 February earthquake. While it was humbling to discover how many friends around the world New Zealand has, I would rather that we didn't have to repay friendship so quickly.

Many of us in New Zealand are asking, "is there a link between what is happening here and what is happening in Japan?" The answer is probably not even though in Canterbury we are on the same tectonic plate that caused the mega thrust earthquake in Japan.

So witnessing the absolute power that Mother Nature can unleash on us is scary, it's perhaps pertinent to remind ourselves that we don't own this planet. We are residents and we have to ride out what our home throws at us. Even if we are really well prepared, as Japan is, there is only so much you can do when a mega thrust earthquake occurs and in Japan's case, the tsunami's that can accompany them. I don't think that anyone who saw those images of the black water surging through towns, carrying cars, planes, ships along for the ride, will ever forget the relentless power of a tsunami.

Mark Quigley is again being sought after for his explanations. On Campbell Live on TV3, he again, was able explain, simply, what had happened in Japan and define to the best of the knowledge he had, what was happening here. And while Cantabrians may understand exactly what he is talking about now, whereas many other Kiwi's scratch their heads, Mark Quigley has provided much needed answers to some pretty important questions. It all adds to my theory that many of the successors to Mark Quigley and his generation of geologists, are going to come from the Canterbury region.

A Word About Aftershocks

The 4th of September 2010 at 4:35 am turned many people in Canterbury's lives around. It's epicentre was very near a place called Charing Cross, which unlike its London namesake, is hardly a bustling centre of activity, even though it's an intersection of six roads. The nearest towns are Darfield, Kirwee and West Melton. It's roughly halfway between Darfield and Burnham Military Camp. It's roughly 40 km's from where I live in Christchurch and unusually for New Zealand, the road distance is not much longer than the distance a harrier might fly to get there.

When we were all awoken that morning, Canterbury residents got a crash course on what it's like to live in a quake zone. Pretty soon the reason why so many Canterbury residents struggled to get a good nights sleep for the next few weeks made its presence felt. Aftershocks. There were several big ones following the main quake. All were preceded by the ominous rumble. Something that worried us all was the geologists saying there is always a large aftershock one magnitude unit less than the main quake.

The Wednesday following the earthquake there was a particularly nasty aftershock. It had us running for the door frames. After it finished, I breathed a sigh of relief. "There's our big aftershock", I told the family. But no. It was 5.1 on the Richter Scale. That was a lesson in proximity and depth of an earthquake.

As the months went past, so did the threat of a large aftershock. We were told to expect a magnitude 5 or more aftershock every four or five weeks. While we were in Auckland, Christchurch had a 5.1 aftershock. About five weeks after that, we had the deadly 6.3 aftershock. It started its own aftershock cycle. Only 15 minutes afterwards, a 5.7 aftershock hit the city. This one on its own was bigger than any of the aftershocks following the September earthquake. Mid afternoon, another one struck, this time 5.5 but very frightening.

The September earthquake and the February aftershock have been frightening enough, but for the hours, days, months afterwards, peoples anxiety levels are high. Some people outwardly are quite relaxed about aftershocks whereas others find them difficult to cope with. When I say difficult, I mean they can be absolutely hysterical when they strike.

I probably fall into the relaxed category with aftershocks, but that doesn't mean that I'm not anxious over them. After six months, my heart pounds and I hold my breath when I hear the familiar rumble. As I write, a 3.7 aftershock struck and even though it's relatively small, it was quite sharp. Half an hour later, I've finally calmed down.

There's been about 5000 aftershocks since September. Don't know for how long they are going to go on for.

From Silence Comes Strength

It was only last December that we last did this. Stood in silence as a nation to remember those who had died. It was for the Pike River and at the time, it seemed incomprehensible that there was a death toll of 29. The Cathedral bells in Christchurch rang for each of those miners - just people going about their jobs when something happened. At my workplace at the Christchurch City Council, we stopped and stood as one. Many emotional and disbelieving people. "How could this happen?" We stood as one for our West Coast whanau. The raw, emotional power of standing in silence in honour of your fallen brothers and sisters. They could have been people you met in the Nelson Creek pub. You could have spoken to one of them when visiting Greymouth. You could have joked and laughed with them in a Blackball Street. The West Coast has the reputation for some of the friendliest people you could ever meet anywhere in the world. It wasn't fair.

The two minute silence was a way for many New Zealanders to say to the West Coast "We are all Coasters and you are New Zealanders. We are with you and we share your grief". For the Coasters who attended the memorial service to know that, would have felt comforting.

When discussing Pike River with friends, family and work colleagues, we felt compelled to compare it directly to our own experiences with the 4 September earthquake. I felt, as many others did, that we were lucky. Nobody died, it was only bricks and mortar, and because Pike River had a high death toll, those communities would find it difficult to overcome this tragedy.

One week ago, our own tragedy happened. For those who were in the central city at that time, they would have all known that a tragedy of huge proportions had occurred. The luck we had with the first earthquake had run out. As the death toll rose and the names started appearing, we started to recognise these people who have died. The enormity of what has happened started to sink in.

Today there was two minutes silence for the victims of the 22 February earthquake. All I can think of when I see the images, is what strength those of us who are struggling to deal with this can gain, knowing that our fellow Kiwi's and Aussies and citizens of the world, who are probably desperate to help in any way they can, are giving us.

To all of you. Thank you. You give me strength to deal with tomorrow. And the next day.

Kia Ora.