EARTHQUAKE (+Hollywood & Santa Monica)

I wasn't wrong (see previous entry). Sean was very wakeful in the night with a fever. I had gone to bed about 12 after writing postcards and diary. At 2:30am I gave Sean Panadol and sponged him down. At 5am I awoke, wondering what on earth the couple in the next room were doing, then I realised the shaking was of the whole room. We were moving from side to side quite violently. It was an earthquake.

Pete and I seemed to both jump out of bed at the same time, shouting "earthquake". We ran to get the kids, but for what, I'm not sure. We were on the seventh floor and quite helpless. It seemed to go on forever. Finally it subsided and people started opening their doors into the corridor with all sorts of cries of amazement.

We had not lost power, but Pete and Nicole had been watching out the window great flashes of blue on the horizon as transformers were blowing out. We immediately turned on the radio and the announcer said he was working in complete darkness. People started to call in with their impressions. Most said it was the worst they had felt, that it was a rolling sideways motion and that it was much longer than previous ones. It turned out that it was 7.4 on the Richter (!!) and centred around the Joshua Tree area. We just sat and watched TV for the next couple of hours. We heard a few sirens but there were no signs of obvious structural problems around us and no fires that we could see.

One little girl had been killed by a falling chimney. The Disneyland Hotel was evacuated as a precautionary measure, as a couple of cracks had been discovered. We later were talking to someone who had been staying there, and she said that most of the guests had checked out and the place was just about empty.

The TV alerted us to the fact that we should expect aftershocks following an earthquake of that magnitude, and we were feeling rather nervous about being on the 7th floor. Pete maintained that since we had survived the original quake we would be alright.

We were all feeling very shaken and after such a poor night's sleep I could feel the ground shaking with every step I took. All I wanted to do was leave the building, but Sean was still quite sick and I was sponging him all the while to try and get his temperature down. Just as he ran to the toilet to vomit we were hit by an aftershock. I was beginning to think of this holiday as more of a nightmare.

At 8:05 the building again started to shake violently. It appeared to be as bad if not worse than the first, and there had been a heavy thud upwards halfway through.

At this point we decided we couldn't stay there a minute longer, grabbed the kids and left the building. We took the stairs, of course, and just went out to the car and listened to the radio. People now were talking about this latest quake: was it a new quake or just an aftershock? Most seemed to think it was worse. It was eventually confirmed to be a separate quake closer to the San Andreas fault, measuring 6.5.

I can't remember feeling as scared as I did then, although I felt safe out in the car park. The problem I was grappling with was how I was going to go back inside the hotel again. We were staying here a week!

After an hour or so, I can't remember, Pete decided we should go in and get packed up and continue our plans for the day. Joel & Sean were still in pyjamas and I was the only one who had been showered. I was trying to stay calm, particularly as Joel was petrified and wouldn't go anywhere on his own, let alone in the shower. We gathered things in a hurry and left.

We had planned to do some sight-seeing - Hollywood & so on, so we decided to continue with these plans. We started to look for somewhere to eat breakfast and found a place called Pete's Pancakes. We all ordered pancakes but none of us could finish, and Sean didn't eat a single bite of his. He just felt sick and went running off to the toilet with the runs. I think my appetite was somewhat suppressed by my autonomic nervous system. I was still feeling frightened and wary of walking inside any building. So not a very pleasant meal.

Off we headed for Hollywood. There were no signs of damage around. We arrived in Hollywood and found a parking spot near Mann's Chinese Theatre. It was hot and Sean was finding the going tough. I would really have preferred to curl up under a shady tree with Sean and take a nap. Outside the famed Theatre Sean started throwing up, so I left the others and went looking for a restroom which I found in a souvenir shop. The two guys in there discussed the earthquake with me. Sean sparked up and asked to buy some Hollywood Boulevard keyrings with our names on them.

We then waited under a tree for the others to return. We spoke for a while to a local walking his two dogs. He offered Sean a soda and said that he was thinking of leaving Los Angeles. I was thinking of doing the same thing.

From here we began driving around Hollywood Bvd, Sunset Bvd, Vine St and made our way down Hollywood Boulevard down to see Rodeo Avenue with reputedly the most expensive shops in the world?! America?! We drove around Beverly Hills but didn't spot any stars. We then drove down towards Santa Monica and decided we'd look for Venice Beach which Pete had read about. There were crowds and crowds of people down there, including a large number of blacks. You sometimes wonder if you live on the same planet as some of these people.

There were large numbers of street stalls - rather like sideshow alley at the Show. As well, people were engaged in a wide variety of activities. For a while we watched 3 guys playing the bagpipes, then moved over to a large group of people where loud rap music was being played. Here people were rapping on rollerskates in a small concrete dance floor. We watched, fascinated.

Further on we came across a set of witches hats where a small dark boy was dressed up in a suit, white shirt and bow tie, wriggling his way around the bollards on a skateboard with two separate ends, called a Snakeboard. Close by, a man was putting on a performance entertaining an ever-growing crowd of people. He was eating fire, balancing things and generally humouring the crowd. His vocabulary included a fair number of "colourful" words. He finished by balancing a girl on a chair on his chin.

Elsewhere people were playing hockey on roller blades/skates or just roller blading or riding bikes along the wide pathway. Some people were actually on the beach, which seemed quite incidental to the other activities here. Further on were basketball courts, and then several sets of rings and climbing equipment, then an outdoor gym where people were working out lifting weights and so on.

We bought drinks/ice creams - Sean and I had a shave ice cone, then started to wander back through the vast milling crowd. The whole atmosphere was excited, and because most of them were black I was a little nervous. I was still feeling nervous about the morning's happenings anyway, and occasionally dreaded the thought of going back to the hotel.

I overheard someone saying "I've never seen so many people here" and wondered whether it had something to do with the earthquake. The boys played for a while on some play equipment. Sean sat in the sand for a while making a little castle. He was still very subdued.

We made our way back to the car and I discovered that my watch was missing. It must have dropped off my wrist, which it had done once or twice before.

Before arriving home we stopped at Po'folks, which fed us all for $28. Incredible considering the amount of food we were given. Nicole brought two of her chicken pieces back with her, Sean had only one or two bites, and I only managed about 3/4 of mine. The whole place was decked out in pictures and views of country America - Huck Finn style with lots of misspellings on the menu. Our drinks were served in jam jars.

As we approached the hotel, Joel began to whimper and I had a lump in my stomach. I knew I couldn't possibly sleep up there after this morning. After a few minutes in the room I spoke privately with Pete about alternatives and we decided to at least try a room on the ground floor where we could at least get out of the building more quickly. As well, we would feel less swaying down there. Pete went to the desk, and apart from the fact that the rooms weren't adjoining, I was happy that we got two rooms on the ground with a door straight out to the pool area. Nicole's room even had a fridge and a microwave.

I climbed into bed and snatched bits of sleep. I would not sleep well for days.Read more