In shock, and awe

Buildings swayed but did not fall, and there was no widespread panic. Somnath Majumdar was in Tokyo during the recent earthquake.

When you experience 90 aftershocks over two days, you lose sense of what is real and what is not.

It was the afternoon of the fourth day of my all-expenses-paid holiday in Tokyo, a bonus from Dentsu where I work as a vice-president. My colleague and I were trawling the flea markets of Asakusa in midtown Tokyo, famous for the ancient Senso-ji temple, when suddenly the rack of shoes I had been looking through began to rattle. At first, I thought someone was shaking the shelf, and it soon stopped. But when it happened again, we dropped everything and ran out of the shop. Outside the scene resembled something from a Hollywood movie, with the buildings on either side of the street swinging and parked cars shaking as if someone inside was jumping up and down. Our first instinct was to go underground, into the subway, but we realised immediately that it would be dangerous, so we rushed to the main road. That was when we felt the worst tremor, lasting three or four minutes, which we later found out measured 8 on the Richter scale. Standing on the road, I felt like I was trying to balance myself in a boat in choppy water.

By then, all cars had stopped and everyone was on the road. But Tokyo is built in such a way that there was no major damage. No buildings toppled. And there was no widespread panic. When the next major tremor happened, we saw the Sky Tree, the world’s tallest broadcasting tower, swinging. People were afraid it would collapse, but miraculously nothing happened. We were trying to make our way back to our hotel, which had to be done on foot since the subway, the lifeline of the city, had shut down, and there were no taxis or buses. An 8 km walk turned into a 25 km trek because we were unable to get proper directions, the locals being more used to advising subway routes. There were reportedly around 2 million people on the roads that day trying to make their way home, like us. It was only when we saw a TV screen in a shop that we got a sense of what was happening.

We reached our hotel at around 7 at night. There was electricity but we were unable to use our cellphones, a measure taken to prevent the spread of panic. Landlines and the Internet were working. I managed to let my family know that I was all right. Though many people spent the night in the hotel lobby, we decided to go to our rooms. But I couldn’t sleep because of the aftershocks, one after the other. I had gone to bed fully dressed with my passport, ticket and money in my pocket, ready to make a dash for it. At one point I was even convinced I would not see my family again.

We spent the next day, Saturday, just walking around the city, most of which had shut down. The metro was operating at half capacity, with the frequency of trains being reduced from every three minutes to every 15-20 minutes. We considered leaving that day, instead of as scheduled on Sunday, but decided against it because we were unsure if we would be able to make it to the airport on time. We managed to get a bus to the airport the next morning, reaching well in time. There was chaos there but there was a method to the madness, with authorities handing out blankets and taking care of distressed passengers.

We reached Delhi on Sunday night, to the relief of our families and friends. Though neither my wife nor I go to the temple usually, we did the next night, and I thanked God from the bottom of the heart. I also prayed for the people and authorities in Japan, who were handling the crisis with such fortitude.

(As told to Indulekha Aravind)