I really don’t know what to say…..for perhaps the first time I’m so overwhelmed that I can’t conjure up a sentence that would make some sense.

So much can change in so little time….what power do we humans have in front of God’s force?

“…….

Sleeping on the floor always meant I’d fall a little to the left or a little to the right while I was sleeping now and then:/ …so initially I thought maybe it was a dream or my sleep-deprivation that was making me tremble so…but after a while…when it wouldn’t stop…I woke up with a jolt myself realizing it was an earthquake…

Many a times a quake has occurred while I’m half asleep and without realizing much and taking God’s signs more or less for granted (I admit with alot of guilt), have fallen back to sleep only to announce in the morning “did you feel that?”
and that was that…

but today was different….I felt as if it wouldn’t stop…reports now show that it lasted around 6 minutes or so…even more in affected areas of kashmir…

I panicked and didn’t know what to do…the first thing that came to my mind was my parents..without remebering the many times I’d disagreed with them..something like a pre-programmed message inside my brain, I somehow felt that they would make the panic go away like they had always done when I was a child…I’d never thought like this before…

Amidst the shaking and the rattling of the windows and my pc…I got up and staggered to my parents room..I’d seldom done that before either…

But by the time I got to the room..the shakes subsided…I felt relived and confused at the same time…I think I still didnt quite understand what had happened or how I’d taken those few steps…In my dazed state…I fell aslp again…right there in my parents room!

What woke me up…a while later was a msg from my friend from the hostel…”u ok? hows everyone in your family?”
I realize the earthquake was bigger then I thought it was..

Switching on the tv…which is always fixed to Geo, since its the last thing my dad watches at night…I realize the horror…
Whenever we travelled to islamabad…we used to stay in Park towers..we could see Margalla towers from our window…today thinking of the people and the place and telling myself that the images I saw on tv were all very real..I felt increasingly uncomfortable…

I suddenly realized all my islamabad friends live in apartment buildings too…what followed was a series of calls and sms-es to everyone. Thank God everyone was fine. My friend tells me about her shaken up 8 year old sister…about how they ran from the 4th floor in their nightsuits and about how they are now moving to another relatives single storey house in islamabad.

I forgot all about my assignnments and my midterm exam and spent the day switching channels…Geo, CNN, Ary, Aaj, Sky news and back again…what struck a nerve was that Fox news issued NO report of the quake until after 4 pm. And they say i’s NOT over yet….after shocks are expected to contiune for the next 48 hours…

I can’t still get myself to believe the extent of the disaster…my heart goes out to the people up in azad kashmir. I’ve been to that place…Muzaffarabad, Mansehra, Abbotabad…I can’t imagine the beauty being taken over by rubble and the sadness of loss of life.

…….”