LeFlic17

We left Christchurch and drove South setting up on a campsite at Portobello on the Otago Peninsular. It was windy to say the least but it suited the dramatic scenery. On day one we headed for Taiairoa Head where there is a nesting colony of Albatross.

Fortunately we saw some ‘teenage’ birds in flight as those sitting on nests are of little interest visually (the life cycle story of the Albatross is some thing else though).

The roaring forties were full in our face at the head - the birds apparently love it! I took the opportunity to seek out some birds that could be viewed other than for a few minutes through dirty glass.

That’s better.

Yesterday we spent at Allan’s Beach, Sandymount and Sandfly bay. Amazing scenery and some wildlife. The weather eased a little as well.

Taking a break from project Aftershock for a few weeks to keep a long time promise to do a New Zealand road trip. So here we are in Christchurch spending a couple of days prior to picking up the camper van.

It seems I cannot escape earthquakes. Since we have been here I’ve taken an interest in the aftermath of the Christchurch quakes of 2010 and 2011. Above is the Cathedral as it is today. The diocese reckoned it was too expensive to rebuild it so were about to demolish it until a heritage group took them to court and had a preservation order put on it.

So they built a ‘transitional’ cathedral from cardboard!! It is designed to last fifty years and I think it will take a fair chuck of that to restore the old one. much of the city was ruined by the second three earthquakes all on one day in February 2011. On first glance it is surprising that there is still so much to do, so many empty damaged buildings and so much building work still going on five years later. Then when you consider the need for machinery, materials, manpower and of course money it becomes clear what a massive task it is for such a small remote country. The Irish are proving a lot of building manpower I guess the recession there and the need here coincided nicely.

The use of shipping containers for temporary shops, prevention of landslides/building collapse and a myriad of other uses, anything but shipping, is somewhat amazing.

In the city centre is this memorial, 185 chairs one for each of the people killed in the earthquake. It is surprising that so few perished when you see the extent of the building damage.

We’ve not only been doing earthquake research, as topical as it is at present. In addition to the compulsory checking out bars and eateries we’ve visited the coastal suburbs,

New Brighton - not unlike Margate 

and Sumner Bay- somewhat classier than New Brighton.

Meet Shristi

Shristi is fourteen years old. Before the earthquake in April 2015 Shristi faced many challenges in her young life. As if being born into poverty, a female in a male dominated culture wasn’t bad enough Shristi was born with Downs Sydrome. Any disability is yet another insurmountable problem for a family to face in their efforts to survive in the harsh culture of rural Nepal. Shristi did though have a close loving extended family, she did have a comfortable home. Then came the earthquake.

The family home was destroyed. Over six months later and this is where the family are now living.....

The worst impact of the earthquake though is not the visible damage to buildings, eventually they will be rebuilt, it is that on top of everything else Shristi has been left severely traumatised by the earthquake and the aftershocks that followed it.  It is not easy to see Shristi’s PTSD but perhaps a little easier than in the many, many other children who have also been left traumatised and unable to get treatment, unable to even have their symptoms recognised.

Shristi attends a development centre for children in her village of Salyantar in the Dhading District of Nepal. The centre is supported/funded by Kidasha (www.kidasha.org) so Shristi has at least some of her education, health and welfare needs met - no where near what she needs but infinitely more that if Kidasha did not exist.