Shakes the Tectonic Plate

About a week ago I bought a new carpet. I wasn't planning on buying one, but my friend suggested I join him and another colleague for a visit to his carpet guy and I figured, "Why not?"

So of course I ended up buying a carpet. It was more than I was thinking I would be willing to spend, but it's nice and I like it. So there. For those of you who are dying to see it, here's a picture. It's about two meters by three meters, and it's a Mushwari (mixed kilim and carpet) made from camel-hair with natural-colored wool and naturally dyed wool ...

Now then, two nights ago at 12:53 am I was pulling staples out of my recently-bought carpet when I heard a boom and things in my room started to rattle. It felt like a Mack truck going by. Then my wardrobe started to rattle and I stood up, put my hand on it, and realized that EVERYTHING was shaking. It only lasted for about 15-20 seconds, and afterward I got my shoes on and went outside. One of my colleagues was wandering around:

"Was that an earthquake?"

"Yeah! My heart is pounding."

"Mine too. Whoah. That was my first."

"Yeah me too."

"Ok, well, gnight."

"Yeah, gnight."

And that was that. I had lived through my first earthquake. According to the USGS it was 5.9 on the Richter Scale, epi-centered in Badakhshan, South of Feyzabad. I was a little worried about the angle of my eight-foot wardrobe that sits at the foot of my bed (it tilts away from the wall about 10 degrees), but I managed to sleep.

Did I say that was that? Oh right. Well, last night I woke up from a deep sleep at 3:45 am or so to my bed vibrating like Magic Fingers. Only I didn't have any quarters and it wasn't Magic Fingers. This one lasted about 15 seconds ... should have been long enough for me to jump out of bed and run downstairs and out the front door, right? Well, I didn't do that. I just made sure my wardrobe wasn't going to fall on my bed and then just rode it out. I think my heart rate was up, but that didn't stop me from rolling over and going back to sleep once the bed stopped shaking. Five minutes and I was out. This second one was slightly less powerful apparently: 5.7 on the Richter Scale according to the USGS, and less than 10 kilometers from the previous night's epicenter.

I had survived my second earthquake in just over 24 hours.

Today I'm not taking any chances. I had our logistics office shim my wardrobe up from the floor so it's flush to the wall (actually leaning towards the wall now since of course the walls aren't straight). Tomorrow they are installing brackets to anchor it to the wall. I also packed my grab-bag, just in case: warm clothes, shoes, first aid kit, passport, money, headlamp, Leatherman, duct tape, and a few other essentials.

Like I said, I'm not taking any chances.