It weighed in at 6.4 at the epicentre just east of Crete. It must have
been about 5 or 4.8 by the time the shockwave reached Cairo some 500Km
away.
We were on the 6th floor. A small rumble then the crystal on the
chandeliers began to tinkle. Then the anchor of the chandelier to the
ceiling moved. Then the floor went a funny shape, something like a
wave. For some reason, you cover your ears with your hands. Then it
stopped. No damage. It made me think.
It made consider and appreciate my own less than microscopic status in
this world.
An earthquake is deaf and blind. It just goes that way or the other and
does not steer itself to avoid humanity. It just goes its own sweet
way.
All of this. All of it, high, big and grand. All of our achievements,
pyramids, moon landings, pics from Mars, Beethoven's late quartets,
computers and everything else, all of it can go in less than the blink
of an eye.
The great fault line that created the Rift Valley, the Red Sea and the
Dead Sea and God knows what else seems to have shifted a couple of
degrees west. Few more countries are now included in the deadly game.
And life is a roulette. The only thing you can do is to surrender all.
Few thousand more people dead in 2 recent quakes. I feel for them and
yet, how I long to be 'inhuman'.
How I long to be non-human! How I long to be a speck of cosmic dust
hurtling at unspeakable speed from nowhere to nowhere!
I am too bored for all of this now.
Ahmad
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