Thrilled Moments of Earthquake in Nepal in 2015

Today date- “Baisakh 12” (25^th April 2021), when somebody say Baisakh 12 my hands get shake, eyes get shattered, and feel devastated being nostalgic to the momentary timeframe not even a minute which was enough to destroy the 600,000 structures in Kathmandu and nearby towns and kill nearly 9,000 people- Earthquake Baisakh 12 2072.

Today, I am going to put my pen on paper explaining the detail about my thrilling experience of escaping the death when you are trapped from all the directions and when natural disaster becomes your greatest enemy. There is a saying in Nepalese community –

‘When hero dares it will take a year but when nature/fate decides it doesn’t take even a minute to destroy all’. Which proved to be absolutely right in this case.

2015 April 25, just like other normal days, similar to everybody’s life, I was also busy in my daily activities. My husband had already left for his office and I was busy taking care of my 1.5 years old son and doing some household chores. It was immense pleasure for me to be with my son for 24/7 after being a mother. The day I felt him in my womb to the date today, I felt that he is the greatest gift that I ever have in my life. It always amazes me and feel wonder for this beautiful creation of the God and having a baby and life in it.

Though, my son couldn’t talk to me properly at that time, because he was very small, but we already started to feel the likes and dislikes of each other. We already started being compatible to each other and found him very understanding, smart and pretty from his toddler. That day too, he wasn’t much happy with me since I was busy in washing clothes. He waited for me for long time wishing to finish my work quickly and feed him milk, but he was too tired of waiting and slept where he was. And I let him sleep comfortably in the bed and went downstairs to hang the clothes under the sun.

It was already been 6 years we were living in Katunje, Bhaktapur in rent. And it was always disappointing moment for me as well as we Nepalese people to live in rent in Kathmandu specially, that you will never feel that you have owned the house despite paying bulky amount of money every month. The stories of tenants in Kathmandu are so miserable that you have to fight with the landlords for the very basic requirements like water, electricity, internet, garbage management, parking, cleaning facilities, etc. and so on.

As I was hanging the half of the clothes from the bucket, the earth started shaking. Suddenly, I realize that it was earthquake. At the beginning, I thought that this earthquake was similar, smaller like before which we had experienced time to time before and therefore, I didn’t care much. But it started to burst up suddenly like a rocket and shake heavily. I remembered my tiny son who was sleeping in depth in the 2^nd floor of the building.

I just shouted- ‘Somebody please save my son… please save my son… please bring my son down…’ I myself tried to get upstairs to bring my son down. As I could step 2-3 steps in the stairs, the earth started shaking up-down, right-left, zig-zag and so on.

I couldn’t even hold myself in the stairs to save myself from falling down, I felt like I had been swung in the swing. I was trembling in fear thinking that day would be the last day in my life. The building would fall over me and I wouldn’t be able to reach to my son, grab him in my chest. At that moment, I was just wishing to hold my son and at least die together. For momentarily, I felt dark all over, and could hear everyone around were screaming at once. The falling of the trees, houses, water tanks from the top floor, bars, the earth’s tear in many nearby places, people jumping from the windows in hopelessness were all at once that as if they created single gigantic voice out of all the noises. I still wonder today remembering those noises, sound of earth below us which was as loud and thundering as if many heavy clouds were colliding together to pour the heavy rain. We could feel that the earth is very angry with us and going to punish us with most disastrous punishment ever.

After sometimes the earth was little bit calmed, and I found a bit safe as the house we rented was earthquake resistant which I knew later on and felt fair enough to pay bulks of penny every month and felt relieved. As soon as I went to near my son, I hold him as if mom chicken protects its children. The earth was still shaking, so I evacuated the house as soon as possible and went to nearby park or lawn or meadow.

Just opposite to where we were living, there was very old colonies of Newar community in Bhaktapur. Where there were still some very old houses protected by the bars previously. Many of those houses were without pillars but having many storeyed. The locals of there were only considered generating the monthly income from the renting their house rather than maintenance and restructuring the houses accordance with rules and regulation of Building and construction law and standards. So, I could see cloud of dust bumping in the sky which was due to thousands of houses destroyed in a minute located just opposite to the 6 lane Bhaktapur road in Thimi area, as I was in the height of Katunje, Shallaghari. Suddenly, I realize that just below that bump of dust there is my husband college that he used to mention again and again that the college building is too old, hackneyed that if he kicks its wall once, it will fall/tear down immediately. My heart was cold, shrank in pain, couldn’t imagined what might happened. The many damn things were replayed in my mind again and again. I could do nothing just praying to the God for my husband safety. Human beings are imperfect beings operating in a world over which they have diminishing control.

After sometimes all the people hiding inside the house slowly started coming out of the house. My 2 nieces who lived close to me came looking for me were in bluish in colour in fear and trauma. They started explaining how they tried to hide themselves under the bed which they were taught in the school, but soon they realized that the house was very old to stay inside and escaped as soon as possible.

I tried to call my husband many times but he didn’t receive the phone. My heart started beating very fast imagining the consequences that might happen at that scenario. Soon there was no network, no electricity, no internet everything was cut down. My niece could at least upload in the facebook that “We are Safe”. After sometimes, I could see my husband coming towards me and I felt relieved.

Everybody was very busy in describing how they saved themselves, what they were doing at the time of shaking. Everyone had their own story and they were not even waiting for their turn to speak; they were just going on and on…. just like the fish market. The earth was still shaking non-stop. There were countless aftershocks going on and on, such that we felt we were still playing swing in the open air and this time the Earth was swinging us. We all remembered the movie 2012 and were sure that whatever given in that movie will be going to be true and we are going to become the first victim of this natural disaster. Only some people had carried mobile with them, other all had run out without even sleepers in their feet. They could find network only sometimes and tell us that Dharahara, an ancient monument, the tallest tower of Nepal is destroyed, the earth has teared in parts in this place…, in that place, etc. As we were out of contact, network, electricity, our mobiles were dead. We just listened the rumour but didn’t know about the actual destructions happened in the country. Since it was Spring season, the earth and the sky both together were in competition to give us trouble. The earth was shaking, the clouds were thundering, the sky was raining together…, just together.

Some of the active people they arranged tents, steels, cardboards, bamboos, beds, sheets, waterproof fabrics, etc. to make emergency shelter for 100-200 people around, where we could only get chance to sit and take rest but no place to sleep.

We lived in that shelter for 3 days and came back to our hometown Butwal after 3 days and for the first time felt so overwhelmed for not being permanent resident from Kathmandu.

The quake was followed by hundreds of aftershocks, and only 17 days later, there was another major quake, a magnitude 7.3 temblor. Thirty-nine of the nation’s 75 districts with a population of 8 million people — about a third of the national population — were affected. Hundreds of thousands of people lost everything and faced extreme poverty. More than 600,000 homes were destroyed and more than 288,000 were damaged in the 14 worst-hit districts. The quakes’ strongest impact was in remote rural areas, making the response extremely challenging. It was the deadliest earthquake in the seismically active region in 81 years.

To be continued….

Recently, Gautam lives in Australia.