A Shaky Few Days

I knew coming into this year that I would experience things I had never been faced with before. Over the past few weeks I have been experiencing something that I hadn’t put any thought into being a possibility when I left Pittsburgh to come here. In the past month the southern region of Malawi has experienced multiple earthquakes.

 

Being from Pittsburgh, earthquakes are not something that I am overly familiar with, nor are they something I have had any previous experience with. The first earthquake hit Malawi on March 8 at around 11:00 a.m. The magnitude of the earthquake was listed at a 5.6 and could be felt hundreds of kilometers away from the epicenter. Honestly I didn’t even feel the first earthquake because I was driving at the time it hit, and the rumble of the road masked the tremor of the earth. 

After the first earthquake hit, I made sure to follow up with the local news to see if the tremors had caused much damage, or God forbid, any fatalities. Luckily, although ranked as a moderate earthquake, it did little damage and no one was seriously hurt from the activity. The only evidence I could see from the shaking were some flecks of ceiling paint that had fallen to the floor and onto my bed. This was not to be the only earthquake to occur, however. On March 17 the ground started shaking again; this time I wasn’t driving. 

When the second earthquake (or aftershock perhaps, I’m not entirely sure) hit, Lauren and I were visiting one of our friends at their house. It didn’t even register to me at first that it was another earthquake until one of them yelled “earthquake”. We all ran outside and stood there until the rumbling stopped. It didn’t last very long, maybe 30 seconds, but in the moment it feels much longer. This second tremble was slightly less powerful registering at 4.9 on the Richter scale (out of 10). It again, thankfully, did not cause any structural damage, injuries or fatalities. 

The aftershocks (or other quakes) weren’t finished after that, however. That night at about 4:00 a.m. I awoke and realized that the entire bed was shaking. Before I was awake enough to process what was going on, or could even react, the tremors stopped. After the shaking had stopped I made sure Lauren and Remus were okay and that I was in fact, not dreaming, which I thought for a moment might have been the case. Thankfully, again. there does not seem to be any damage from these activities. 

I could never have imagined earthquakes would be something that I would encounter during my time here in Malawi. They have been an impressive reminder that I cannot even begin to fathom the ways in which I will continue to grow and be stretched this year as I face things. I am grateful for all these reminders, but even more grateful that these events did not cause damage, injuries or death to this nation that already faces enough hardships. Thank you for your continued prayers for safety.