The Earthquake from Heather’s point of view:
Saturday February 27th at 3:34am (Chilean time or 1:34am EST), I was shaken awake by this amazing movement of my bed. I rushed into the hallway outside the kids two bedrooms, flinging open Caleb's door and telling both kids to get down beside their beds to make the ¨triangle.¨ Just then I heard Doug's voice say, ¨No, Heather. We need to get outside.¨ I have no idea how we all got down the stairs, especially without falling. I don't know how we got to the corner of our yard near our neighbor's house wall and our front driveway gate. I don't remember my feet hurting on the sidewalk since we weren't wearing shoes.
I do remember, huddling, holding Caleb close while Kiwi, our dog, tried to snuggle in too. Then I remember praying. Praying for safety. Praying for our neighbors. Praying for our ABWE team members. Praying for our national brethren.
I remember listening to things crash, glass breaking, and other things falling. It's all a blur to me right now.
Once it stopped we went back inside to get shoes, sweatshirts, and flashlights. Then it was out into the street to talk to our neighbors. Everyone was fine. Once everything had calmed down we went inside. I went to Hannah's room to lay down with her for the night. Upon entering the room, Hannah cries, ¨Mommy, the earthquake knocked everything down in my room!!¨ Then she proceeded to cry.
Keep in mind that I had been in her room to get her shoes and robe just a little while before and hadn't noticed anything different. Hannah's room is almost ALWAYS a mess, so I didn't notice what she did. However, after further probing of Hannah, she told me that it was just her little ¨dresser¨ (8 inches by 8 inches with little box drawers) that held her hair pretties, that had fallen. Indeed they were all over the floor. I proceeded to pick them up and put them back.
The next day, the kids were playing in Hannah's room, and as play, she had dumped all her hair pretties on the floor to use the little cupboard for other things. NO WONDER I hadn't noticed that the earthquake had ¨destroyed¨ her room!!
After getting into bed just after the earthquake, Hannah was sobbing. I suggested to Doug that he pray and he did. Hannah was still sobbing, so I began to sing various kids songs. When I began singing, ¨Halelu-halelu-halelu-halelujah,¨ I poked Hannah to sing ¨Praise Ye the Lord.¨ She joined in and we finished the round. Hannah had stopped crying and I was SOOO thankful!!! about a minute later, we hear from Caleb's room, ¨Halelu-halelu-halelu-halelujah¨ and we answered back with ¨Praise Ye the Lord.¨
On Saturday morning we got up to see all the damage first hand with light. We lost close to 24 feet of the dividing wall between our house and the neighbor’s. We lost a bookshelf in our office and a few sentimental vases. We were emotionally strong probably because of simple adrenaline. We headed down to the ABWE academy where I teach and Doug takes care of all of the ABWE Chile Finances. Praise God that all of the services were working. The school had electricity, internet, water, and local phone! That was truly an act of God!!
Determining everyone on the team was safe and unharmed was a bit of a difficulty due to cell phone service not functioning well and many were without power, internet, and phone. We were able to reach all active missionaries both short term and career by Saturday 10:30 am EST. It took us until Tuesday to reach one of our retired missionaries who lives near Viña del Mar near the coast. Once we contacted our regional administrator with the word that all were ok, we contacted our parents.
We then contacted our pastor to determine that everyone in the church was ok. We learned that all were “shaken” but that only one was missing. Diego, one of our young high school men, was spending the summer in Concepcion (the epicenter) when the earthquake hit. I tried via cell phone to get a hold of him, but of course could not. I contacted his father, here in Santiago and he told me that he couldn’t get a hold of his son either. That’s when I posted on our blog and facebook.
Sunday we headed to church as usual, only this time in jeans because we didn’t know what we’d encounter, plus we still had no electricity to even think about using an iron. At church, we sang praises to God that we were all safe, received word that Diego was fine only without food or water, and then it all hit me. I couldn’t stay in service for the sermon. I had to talk and process. I went to the kids classroom where the littler kids were drawing and talked to fellow missionary wife Jenn (Christian) Rubin. Jenn grew up here and had experienced first hand the earthquake in 1985. Jenn gave me some counsel and I relaxed a bit.
Sunday during the day, we realized that the guard for Santiago Christian Academy was stuck in the south and wouldn’t make it back to work the night shift. Therefore, Doug as current property manager, would have to guard in his place. This meant Doug being gone to guard from 11:00pm to 7:00am. We still had no electricity and I didn’t want to sleep here at home alone with 2 kids and no electric. So, we packed up the essentials and headed to SCA to sleep in one of the apartments.
Monday our team cleaned up SCA. I have to say, that I didn’t do much in the way of cleaning up. After getting up and moving, I had to come home to feed our dog and I had to stop by another missionary’s home to feed their dog. (They’ve been on furlough and so every morning and night we stop there to feed their dog and check on their house.) Because we still didn’t have electric and our missionary friends did, I also took all of our freezer items to their freezer.
Upon returning to the school, I did laundry at the school and made cookies and iced tea for the workers who were cleaning. Meanwhile, Doug, running on NO sleep, was in the office making decisions about what to purchase now for fixing and what could wait. He was also trying to coordinate with the states about relief donations and setting up a donation account at ABWE.
We spent Monday night here with no lights, and returned to spend Tuesday with electric and e-mail at SCA. Doug worked to try to get accounts running again with errands to the bank and a money exchange place. That afternoon was when we learned that our pastor was planning a trip down south to take food and water to one of our national churches and pastor’s family. Doug was planning to go, but right now he is needed in the office and we didn’t know what kind of conditions there would be. Plus, with Doug’s red hair he is an immediate “gringo” target and could endanger the lives of himself and those he would have been with.
Last night (Tuesday) around 7:00 pm (Chilean time) we FINALLY got electricity and internet back! We were able to get a few things done last night and today Doug had to work again at the office, but took the second half of the day to help clean up here. We’ve cleaned up the broken wall and have piled the excess in front of our house for those who will come to haul it away. Our landlord DID HAVE earthquake insurance and so it will take a while for the wall to be assessed and then rebuilt. For now, our kids are enjoying the open space to play with our neighbor’s kids freely. (There is a video of them playing on our blog at http://amundsonanthem.blogspot.com .)
Also today our pastor left with 3 other men and headed down to take food to our national pastor, Esteban Maldonado, as well as to find Diego and his little sister and bring them back here. As of writing this, they are on their way back with Diego and his sister. It may take them quite a while to get back due to road conditions and everyone wanting to get back here to “sanity” and food.
As for the next few days, we wait. We normalize our life and that of our kids’ lives. We spend time with our neighbors bonding. We support and coordinate future trips down south. We want to encourage our national
brethren who are taking the lead. We want to help them financially with all of their efforts. If you would like to contribute especially to the Chilean Relief Effort through ABWE, please contact us and we will get that information to you as to how you can help.
For now, we covet your prayers!!! We need wisdom in processing the emotions that we are feeling. We need wisdom in caring for our national brethren. We need wisdom for… and for… In other words, PLEASE PRAY FOR WISDOM for us and for our whole team here in Chile!!
God bless!
Praising God for HIS provisions!
Heather (for Doug, Caleb, and Hannah too)
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