The Earth is Shaking

Where were you when the July 1990 earthquake happened?

I was in my classroom, writing an article for our Chinese seatwork. My chair suddenly started shaking, so I shot an evil look at my classmate sitting behind me. To my surprise, he (my classmate) seemed as dumbfounded as I was as to why all the chairs inside our classroom were moving. From where I was seated, I could see the nursery building swaying and electrical wires sparking. Classmates crying, teachers running out of the faculty room, instructing all of us to pray (?!?!). It was not a pretty sight. And it was one sight I never wished to see again. Ever.

Before the July 1990 disaster happened, I thought disastrous earthquakes only happened in faraway places like Japan and San Francisco. I would enjoy the several seconds when our house shook, believing that the magnitude never went beyond 5 on the Richter scale. The July 1990 incident changed that belief for me.

With all the earthquake news about Indonesia lately, I can't help but feel paranoid. So when I felt the mild earthquake last Sunday, I jumped up and took shelter under the door frame. The earthquake was over in just a few seconds, and nobody in our house even noticed it.

Today, I got an email from a friend, with the following predictions about the Philippines:

In December 2004, just around the time the tsunami struck, someone came to tell Sister Raquel that "a series of massive earthquakes will hit Metro Manila in 2005." The nun's exact words: "This will originate in Quezon City and a portion of Manila will slide into Manila Bay." She also speaks of movements of the earth in the Pacific, Atlantic, China, the Indian Ocean.

It's not unusual to read and hear about predictions of earthquakes after a major earthquake has just happened. But this email is even scarier because it did not come from Madam Auring or other so-called seers. It came from a woman of the cloth. I checked out the news article in inq7.net, and yes, the article was really published in PDI's March 6 issue. You can read the whole article here.

Searched Yahoo for some interesting information about earthquakes, and I came across this site. Did you know that a total of six earthquakes shook the Philippine soil this week alone? Check this out.

The world is really changing... big time.