You might not have heard of many places in New Zealand, but I bet most of you know of Christchurch. Since September 2010 Christchurch has experienced three earthquakes and many big aftershocks. The biggest quake, on 22nd Feb 2011 caused massive damage and loss of life in the central business district of the city. There is still a 'red zone' there, a big square of the city that cannot be accessed due to continued danger of building collapse.
Christchurch is New Zealand's second biggest city so many people were affected by the earthquake. It is a bit bigger than Leicester in terms of the number of people that live there. Lots of suburbs lost power and water, houses were damaged and flooded. Today there is still much clearing up to be done, not helped by continued aftershocks. Scientists think that these many continue for more than ten years.
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Some people have moved to other areas of the country, but most are trying to clean up and carry on life as normal. They don't want to leave their family and friends. Would you stay?
In the photo above, you can see the spray paint that showed that the emergency services had checked and closed the building in the aftermath of the earthquake.
In the museum is this big display of fabric hearts stitched by people around the world and sent to Christchurch. There were lovely messages of support attached to many of them. Although New Zealand is a small country (about 5 million people, UK is 65 million ish) there are many people with relatives abroad, and New Zealanders who live in other countries - many people around the world would have been affected by the problems in Christchurch.
The city has taken an optimistic stance about the rebuild - many see this as a chance to make a really exciting modern city. There's some cool stuff going on, my favourite was the gap fillers project.
If you click on one link from this blog, make it this one.
Local people have decorated and made public spaces where buildings that were damaged and demolished used to be. The photo below shows one that is a book exchange. You go along and swap a book - easy! Great for folks whose books got soggy from the flooding. There's other sites which have outdoor cinemas, live music, a giant chess set, pianos - look at the link! Amazing!
Re:Start is another project. Many major companies and local businesses have reopened in shipping containers as their original shops were so badly damaged. As you can see they are very colourful, and look pretty good. A great way to get started again in the small space available, and a cool way to reuse shipping containers.
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