The Face Of One Child – Chris Waller

The Face Of One Child Chris Waller

And Kindness Lay All About

Stories from the Christchurch Earthquakes

Š

Glenn Busch

Chris Waller

Yes, I’m independent. A pretty able sort of person I suppose. Sensible

anyway. I’m a kindergarten teacher, so it follows I really like working

with children. I think I’m kind. I like to help people out if I can.

I have my moments I suppose like everyone else, but yes, normal really. Just normal… except of course, nothing is normal anymore, is it. Not round here.

Life stopped being normal that night in September. The way you

thought about life before that night, and the way you think about it

now, are two different things. The plans you have now are poles apart from what they might have been just fifteen months ago. All of us know things now we’d rather not know. We’ve seen things we’d rather

not see. Personally, I shall never forget the face of one child, a little boy who just stood there and screamed. His face is embedded in my

memory forever. He just turned around and screamed and screamed,

and I thought yeah, okay, all these plans we have for such emergencies, all the things we’re supposed to do—yeah, doesn’t work. You just react

on instinct. It was like grab them, grab them if you can and hold them.

Other than that, you wait for it to stop and just get out of there. Just

get outside because inside is not good. Everything is moving, all the cupboards had flown open. The cabinets have moved. Everything is just

everywhere. And on that early afternoon in February, when it happens

1

all again, what do you think? You think oh my god this is worse. This has got to be worse than before. And all the things that people said after

September flood back into your mind. Imagine if this had happened during the day. Imagine if this had happened while everyone was at work. Imagine if… and then you realise that it has happened, it is the middle of the day and all your worst fears have come to pass.

We always said they’d carry us out of here in a box. You know, we

always loved the river view. Absolutely loved the river. Loved the fact that it was quiet and also close to town. Not that we went to town very

much but my husband, Daryl, worked there so it was easy for him. We

loved everything about our home, and now I absolutely hate to come here. Hate driving round here. I don’t come home very much at all now, I just… I just can’t bear to see all the houses, to see the grass so

long and the houses falling down, it doesn’t give you a true measure

of what this community was like. All those people that you’ve known

over time and the school over the road and having the kids walk by

all the time, it was, yeah, just a nice place to live. A wonderful place to live. I remember my son was fixated on the weed cutter man, the

man with the machine that goes down the river clearing the weeds, and when he was a little fella he used to hear him coming and he’d be

at the window, ‘Where’s the weed cutter man?’ So we’d have to go out

and wave to him, all those memories; they won’t seem much to a lot

of people probably, but other mums will know what I mean—the little things about a place that become part of your life.

Our home was special, at least it was to us and we put a lot into it;

every weekend and lots of nights after work. All that time. Knocking

2

down the chimneys, attacking the lathe and plaster, we were permanent

fixtures at the dump every weekend. I remember cleaning off the

wooden panelling and getting incredibly high on methylated spirits

and paint stripper. Sitting there in the corner and laughing hysterically.

All that work, undone in a few violent moments. You don’t feel much like laughing now. Gives you pause… made me, made us, wonder about

the amount of time we’d put into doing renovations. That had been our focus. We loved doing them and we did spend such a lot of time on

our house. Looking back now I wonder whether that’s a good thing.

After it’s gone, you think… you wonder if it was to the detriment of other things. Relationships with friends and maybe not seeing as much

of our families. I mean we saw them of course, we still saw them, but it was the house that was our focus. When you look at it now you

realise they’re just material things and that your relationships are more important. Especially when something like this happens, you realise

how good your friends are and how wonderful your family is. Yeah, helping each other out—that word important—it takes on a different meaning.

Today there are lots of different meanings aren’t there. Things

we are not used to. Different things happening… what’s happening? what’s happening? I was thinking that—actually I was shouting that

out as I woke up—the night it all started. We were in bed, upstairs, and two teenage children downstairs. ‘Move! It’s an earthquake, a big

one.’ That was Daryl. So we dived out of bed, grabbed some clothes, took off downstairs. Got down there and couldn’t get the door open, it’s all dark and crazy and what’s happened? The glass door, that was

3

jammed. Couldn’t get that open. Another door is blocked by fallen books. Okay, we manage to get through it and go to my daughter’s

room. Couldn’t get her door open at all. Turned out the whole front of the house had dropped so all the doors were jammed. By that stage my

son had got out so that was fine, but our daughter—my husband had to

shoulder the door to get her out. We all got out then. Rushed outside.

Pitch black. Noise. You could see the concrete in the moonlight and

you think, my God, look at those cracks. It was just all cracked. How big is this thing? And you wait outside because you think you’ll be all right—we’ll be fine here. The houses were there, still standing, but we

could see cracks in the place next door and we could hear the water.

There was so much water everywhere we thought the riverbanks had been breached. What was going on? We just didn’t know what was happening. And then they were coming again, more large shakes. We will need some clothes, and blankets. Quick, inside and grab them. All

the TVs are down. The next thing is to get the cars out. If we need to get out quickly we can go. The radio in the car is on and it’s like this

must have happened to the whole of Christchurch. I’ve got a friend on the next bend who is parenting alone with her two children, my

son and I went down to make sure she was all right and the water was right up to her house. Probably it was liquefaction. With hindsight it

was liquefaction, but then we thought it was the river. What on earth

was happening? She was hiding under her table and didn’t want to come out to see us. She was quite happy to stay there. Okay, we said we would keep in touch and went back home, just waited for the sun to come up so that we could see what was really happening.

4

As we waited for the light we heard terrible screaming, someone had

come around on the other side of the river, down Banks Ave and had

hit one of the culverts that had popped out of the ground. When you saw it in the daylight it was right out of the ground so they had driven straight into it, a whole lot of young people and they were screaming

and getting quite upset. People on the other side ran down there to help them. There was not much we could do on this side of the river.

As the dawn broke there seemed to be water everywhere and we

didn’t have a clue anymore where it came from. We were standing

around outside looking all about and talking to the neighbour when we

heard this fearful cracking and it was like when the wind blows really bad and the willows crack and break their branches. A real tearing

sound from inside the tree, and we think now it was actually the roots

in the ground, because the ground was still moving. We think that was the sound. It wasn’t trees coming down but it was that same awful sound and when you look you can see. There’s obviously huge gaps

where the land has pulled away and headed towards the river and to

actually see that—it just astounds you, the power... it’s phenomenal.

This was a solid house and look at it, look at it now. My father who

helped us do all the alterations, he’s been blown away by how this beast

has managed to tear the place apart. When you look… when you think what has happened, you can hardly comprehend it.

After that we basically just listened to the radio, hearing all those

comments on the national programme and thinking my God, it must

have happened to the whole of the city. When I finally got through to text everybody—to make sure everyone was all right—I got one back

5

from my godmother in Dacre Street, just by Linwood, and she said, ‘Yes, yes, we are all watching it on the television.’ We just looked

at each other, how can that be? Later we realised the landline was still working and got our old phone out of the garage and started

ringing people. ‘Oh no, we’re fine,’ they all said, ‘we’re fine.’ How

could they be fine when we were so broken, we didn’t understand it.

It was only later we found out much of Christchurch was okay.

Much of it was normal, but not around here, not in the East. We didn’t know why then but Avonside, the Horseshoe Lake people

and Bexley—those sorts of areas—seemed to be the hardest hit. At

the time it was quite difficult to understand, to comprehend any of it. No power. No water. Sewerage obviously wasn’t good. But

when we went to my fathers for showers and so on, everything else seemed normal, everything except us.

We stayed in the house. I don’t suppose we were too keen to

sleep in the house but we all slept upstairs in our bedroom which is above the garage and quite solid because it’s on a block and a

concrete foundation. We all slept in the same room for eight weeks which rather cramped my son’s style big time and I can’t say my daughter liked it much either, but I wasn’t going to let them go anywhere else. I think it was about eight or nine days until we

got our water sorted out. They fixed the water and we still didn’t

have any. I think it took twenty-four hours before we realised the water was on but we still weren’t getting any in the house. It seems the pipes were broken under our lawn. Luckily my husband’s quite

handy and he managed to fix it himself. The sewerage, that was

6

something else. The portaloos came and they stayed. They just stayed. They are here still.

Bewilderment, I think that was probably the most common

reaction at the time. You wondered how we were going to be able to recover from this. We thought it was the whole city and we’re thinking my God, what’s this going to do. No power, no water—

there was plenty of water where it shouldn’t be—but none coming

out of our taps. How long is it going to be like this? Because it happened at night we didn’t see it all straight away, so the impact was probably lessened a wee bit, where as February, we got to see it all. We all saw the trees move. We all saw the buildings move. We saw the ground tear up. And we got to see it in everybody’s face. You

saw the reaction in their eyes, heard the screams. It’s why I think February hit us all so much more.

Everybody got walloped that much harder. There was a lot more

damage to the house. I was at work so that had its challenges with all

the little children. My own two kids were at high school on half day.

One had come home so he was here when everything started flying

around. He took off outside and was okay. My daughter was on a

bus going into town. I didn’t know which bus. My husband was in his building that backed on to Smith City Market’s car park which collapsed, so that was his car gone. It was all pretty intense really. It was, it was seriously intense.

With my job I can’t leave until all those children have gone, so

basically you just switch on to autopilot. I mean we work for a really

good organization and we’ve got all these procedures in place. What

7

we do if this happens. What we do if that happens. And to be honest, it all goes out the window because it’s an earthquake and it’s happened so fast that all the things you practise, like get under a table kids, hold

on to the edge, you just can’t do it. They can’t even hear you because the noise is so loud. No one takes into account all that sort of stuff. The noise and the violence of the building as it moves. One of my team

members fell over and broke her wrist. I went crashing to the ground and then it’s like, okay, it’s stopped. Get all the kids. Get outside. We

counted them and we knew they were all safe. We had them all there and we thought; okay, now we wait. We just wait. Then the parents started to arrive, they came, and afterwards a lot of them said they

were grateful that we were so calm. The truth is we weren’t feeling very calm, no, but you still have to do what you have to do. They are tiny

little children so there is no choice; you have got to be there for them.

It was quite hard, but unlike that Italian ship’s captain you would’ve seen in the news lately, you don’t look after yourself first. You don’t abandon ship.

It took us over two hours to pass on the kids. It wasn’t just the

kids either; it took a while to calm the parents down because as some

of them came in, the looks on their faces, you could tell they were wondering what on earth the place was going to look like. Whether they would be pulling children out of buildings. A couple of the faces were just… one woman, I have never, ever, seen someone so white, and we said, ‘Look, just stay, just stay for a while until you’re okay.’

While we were waiting I got a phone call from my son and

I managed to get a text from my husband asking if I could get our

8

daughter, Nat. We didn’t know where she was and I am frantically

trying to text her and getting nothing. I knew she had been going to

get a bus to go to Christchurch Boys High. I didn’t know whether she was going through town to do that. I didn’t know which bus, so trying

to get her was quite stressful. She was with a friend so I’m texting the friend’s mum and then about 2.30 I think it was, she managed to get a

call to me. She was only 14 then but at least she had enough sense to

ring the kindergarten so I knew where she was. It wasn’t until I got in the car a bit later to go and get her that I heard on the radio about the

buses. About how there had been buses crushed, and I thought, thank God, thank God I didn’t know about that before.

Eventually I managed to get to her but by then I couldn’t drive

home because the roads were so flooded so I left the car at my Dad’s.

It took us at least two hours to walk home. All that time of course my husband has been extremely worried. He was biking around trying to find us. By the time he did finally manage to get a call through he was frantic. ‘Where are you?’

I said, ‘We’re here, we’re just walking round Banks Ave.’

And he said, ‘We who?’ I will never forget the sound in his voice

when he asked me that. On New Year’s Eve I asked him what was the

best thing about the year and he sat for a wee while, and then he said, ‘Knowing that Natalie was okay.’ and I thought yeah, that’s it.

As we walked up the street I saw the house, our home, and had a wee

melt down. But then Daryl reached out, we just grabbed each other for

a while, all four of us, and then he said, ’It’s only a house, and we’re still here. We are all together,’ and I thought yep, that’s what I needed to

9

hear. It’s only a house even though it’s been your home for a long long

time and you’ve got all those memories associated with it, your children and so on, it’s also just a house. I had my family with me and you know I felt for those people who had lost their family members, their loved

ones in town. Wrong place. Wrong time. Horrible… horrible, horrible.

We sat there for a while, just looking at our broken home, then

Daryl said, ‘Right, let’s get the tent out. We’ll put the tent up in the back yard.’ So, between the shakes we got the tent out and that kept everybody busy and focussed. We were out there. We were away from the building. We were safe. We had seen the state of everything

coming home. Daryl had walked home from town. It took him an

hour and a half and he’d come through Madras Street and had seen

all the buildings there so he knew there was no way this was going back to normal any time soon. We had been without power and

water for so long last time and it was going to be even longer this time. Coming out of his office at the bottom of the city he had seen

the dust rising and he knew that it was huge. The car park beside his office building had collapsed and a car had gone through their back wall. His own car had been crushed. Yeah, we’d all seen enough to know this time was different.

When darkness came we got the kids into bed and later Daryl

and I just lay there all night listening to the radio and waiting for the

aftershocks to come through. There was an emergency siren going off

all night long as well. We are not that far from Avonside Girls High, so

I suspect that’s where it was coming from. It was pretty intense, lying

there listening to that ‘whoop, whoop, evacuate the building,’ all night

10

and for half the next day—it must have been a damn big battery. What

with that and hearing the various shakes rattling through, it was yeah, pretty scary, pretty scary, but much better to cope with in a tent than in a house. So much better.

Something else that happened as well. The sticky beaks, the sight-

seers. They really have been challenging. They were bad after September

when the earthquake happened in the early hours of the morning. By about 10 am there were streams of people driving past, to see what the

damage was. It was incredible. Incredible. After February they weren’t that abundant because there were so many other areas that were also

affected. By the same token, in September we saw church groups come around very quickly bringing food, baking and so on, which was

wonderful. The Red Cross came around. The Council came around.

There were a lot of people coming around saying, ‘Are you okay?’ It

was very humbling. But after February there was nobody, just nobody.

And I think that just shows you the impact that it had on the city and how its resources were well and truly stretched. I mean, not that we

expected it, but it was quite noticeable that nobody was coming so that’s when everybody began to pool together. To keep an eye out and look after one another.

We spent nearly three weeks in that tent, then the structural

engineers came around again and said that this time both the front of the house and upstairs as well, were not really safe. They were all right

to go into, but upstairs wasn’t safe to sleep in. And they certainly didn’t think the front of the house was okay. Anyway, my husband talked

me back into the house and we lived in the back and the kitchen and

11

a little upstairs. We lasted three weeks, it was just too damn hard. We finally managed to find a rental property and waited for that to become

vacant. Then we moved out and that wasn’t easy… the feelings you have—yeah, that was pretty hard. We just didn’t think we could stick

it out again this time. It was hard enough after September. You’d get

these people saying, ‘That’s terrible, oh, it’s so awful and it’s like, ‘So, you’ve got damage too?’

‘Oh no, we saw it on TV.’ ‘Oh, okay.’

We didn’t have any power, we didn’t have any water, or any toilets,

and that’s quite hard for people to understand until you experience it for yourself.

Like the roads, I mean huge cracks to the roads and the bridge is

really bad and just how long is this all going to take to fix? Then you get

more people saying, ‘Oh it will be fine by next year. You’ll be fine.’ And January was fine, but then we had February and nothing’s the same anymore. The damage that it’s done to the community round here and to the riverbank and to our lives… is so much more.

Everything is crumbling and what was the Council was going to

do? After September we were going to a whole lot of public meetings about what the Earthquake Commission was going to do with the land. How could they fix things? They were thinking they would drive

these big stone columns down to support the land. They would do this and then we’d be able to rebuild our homes. They would start to repair

people’s houses and you might have to move out for a wee while, but it

would be great. They would fix it. Well, now it had happened again and

12

it seemed there was no way they could… my husband had said all along

he didn’t think it possible but yeah, you grasp at straws. I kept thinking, maybe, maybe. I suppose you want to stay with what you know, don’t

you. Then you get it in black and white and you know you’re done for.

It’s all gone.

Our whole suburb, gone. Someone has decided, a stroke of the pen

and that’s it. The powerlessness you feel in this process is extraordinary.

Everything is taken out of your hands; you are quite superfluous to the

whole thing. I felt we could just disappear and no one would notice, and that is what has happened I suppose.

This is not a posh area around here; it’s a working community.

There’s a few big houses and there’s people doing what we’ve done, put

on some extensions, refurbishing bits and pieces, put some effort into

the place, but basically the homes are simple wooden bungalows with state housing through the back there. Nothing flash, just a normal old suburb that will now come to an end. In its place they are saying they

will build a park, a wonderful park from the city to the sea. That is

something they bandy about. A big park that everyone can enjoy, right along the river where people can run and take their kids for walks and

children can learn to ride their bikes, all that sort of stuff. And that is what I’d like to see happen here now, something for everybody. I think

most of us would. But there is another rumour doing the rounds as well. One where the government, having bought the land, will, at some point, have it remediated and sold to rich people who would pay big

money to live along the river. I hope that is not true. If that were to happen I’d be truly gutted. I’m sure most would feel the same.

13

Anyway, after nearly thirty years in one place we needed to pull

ourselves together and get on with it. First find a place we can rent, a

place just to live in. Then we have to deal with the insurance and EQC, which is something of a nightmare for most people. Then you’ve got to remake your life somewhere else.

Just to get a roof over our heads, okay, that was something of an

education right there. Something we’d never thought we’d have to do

and renting in Christchurch now is not easy. We went to look at a lot

of houses and it was like a scrum. You read the advertisement in the

paper; open home from such and such a time and everyone rolls up.

Everyone jumps out. Rushes in. Grabs the paperwork and that was another thing that just set me off. Never having rented in my life I’m

now faced with all this paperwork, it’s—it’s huge. It was just… I know I’m a nice person. I’m not saying we are better than anyone else but I know I look after my house, and now suddenly we have to go through

all this. The way you are treated… I guess I’ve learnt something new and it’s just so frustrating.

Eventually we a found place and it was like I didn’t know where

I was. I felt like I was on another planet. We had only moved across the city but it was so out of my comfort zone. That probably sounds

pathetic but I didn’t know the streets, it took ages to get anywhere and I didn’t know the community. Not that back home we were in each other’s face all the time but we knew each other. We would smile or

wave as we drove by. We had a dog, so you get to know all the dog

people on the riverbank. You always see the same faces, at school, in the street, in the supermarket, so to go to a community and not recognise

14

anybody, that was really hard for me. To tell the truth I absolutely hated it. Still hate it.

Something I always liked at home was my gardening but I’m not

allowed to touch the garden in the rental place. I do come back home sometimes and do a little bit in the garden here. I hate seeing the house

the way it is but I do still have a certain amount of pride in the way my garden was and so every now and then I come home and pull out the weeds. Actually, I’ve dug a lot of things out and I’ve got them in

pots at the rental house. I’m determined to hold on to something. Ha, I used to growl about it sometimes in the old days but the truth is I do like my garden.

I used to love to run too, jogging or whatever you want to call it.

I haven’t been all that interested lately. I think it’s because I have lost where I used to run. I have lost my view. Run and look, that’s what I

did. Always looking at people’s houses and people’s gardens and yeah, that’s changed hasn’t it. Not a lot to look at now. One day… one day that will probably come back. I hope it will. There’s another day coming

as well, the day our house will come down and it’s a day I’m dreading.

My husband says I shouldn’t see that happen. I don’t know. I don’t know. Perhaps it’s what I need to give me closure.

I hope when we have a new home again things will settle down. I

am sure they will. I hope they will. For the moment though life feels like that word you hear a lot now, limbo. And it’s true, that is where we

are. We’re renting someone else’s house and that means exactly that— it’s their house. It’s like feeling alienated from things. Apart from your

family unit, everything else has changed and now you’re just waiting for

15

that comfort you once had. The luxury, the contentment, of knowing this is your place. This is your home. You can do what you like. It doesn’t matter if your windows are dirty, you are not being inspected by the

property people. You can relax. Having that back would be wonderful.

But the longer this muddle in which so many of us are living goes

on, the more concerned I am that it’s going to start affecting people mentally. It seems like so many things in our lives right now are messed

up. The roads, the school situation, people’s work environments, all the

things that you hope in your life will be—well, as they were before.

That they are not, worries me. I wonder what’s going to happen long

term to a lot of people. The not sleeping, the forgetfulness, not eating well, the feeling of tension and stress which has invaded our lives—my own included—it’s not good. It’s just not good for any of us.

A short time ago we were in control of our own lives, at least it felt

like that. Today it feels like all those decisions you used to make about

your own life have been taken out of your hands. We used to have plans

for the future. We always said that when the kids were off our hands we would travel, but not now. We just won’t have the money. The way

things are going I think I’ll be working till I’m a hundred years old.

And it’s that sort of thing I would blame in large measure for the way we are feeling.

Both Daryl and I are the sort of people that if something needs

doing we figure out a way and we do it. We are not control freaks but we just get it done, and to take all those decisions out of your hands

and put them on someone else’s desk, who could be in Auckland or Brisbane or anywhere but here—someone who doesn’t have any idea

16

of the impact its having on your day to day life—and having to wait

for them to make decisions or wait for them to create processes, that’s been really, really, hard.

We are now, what, fifteen months down the track and we have only

just heard recently that the house is a write off and we still don’t have

the paper work. Is it not obvious the house is a write off ? I mean, hello. That’s a huge amount of frustration but also a huge amount of bad feeling, like when you have to justify absolutely everything to an insurance company. You pay your insurance premiums forever, at least we’re the sort of people that do, and most people do. We all do. So then to have to turn around and justify every little thing has been really

difficult. And guess what, we are resourceful people. We know what we need to do and how you go about it. I feel incredibly sorry for people

that don’t have that knowledge, or have difficulty in understanding

their contracts, their insurance policies, the whole process. Or the elderly who just don’t have the time to waste on waiting for things to

happen. It’s not fair. It’s hard enough for those of us in the middle. Our

children perhaps are going to see an amazing city arise from all this,

at least I keep telling myself that. I don’t know if I fully believe it, still, that’s the tune I play in my head. But the elderly, they are not going to see it, and that’s such a shame.

We are the sort of people who are most equipped to handle these

things and yet you sort of fluctuate. There have been weeks when I’ve

gotten depressed about it all, really depressed, and other times when

you just get very angry. You think why should we have to wait. Okay, everything can’t be done in a day, you have to wait, I understand you

17

have to wait, but it’s extremely frustrating that so often we seem to be

waiting for the silliest of things. We sit here and wait, thousands of us

sit here and wait, while all the decisions you make, every day of your life, have now been taken out of our hands. That’s what I call… I could call it lots of things, but let’s be polite and just call it exasperating!

The irony is that while we sit and wait they are pretty quick to pull

down some of our most important historic buildings, places you think

they might have given a bit more thought to. I find myself struggling with that, all the old landmarks that have gone. We did go into town

when the Cathedral walk was open. I just needed to see it. I stood there and looked up at it and thought to myself, please don’t pull it down.

Some people talk about it being a healing experience, I don’t know

that it was for me. I didn’t go on the bus to look around. I couldn’t quite

cope with that, but I did need to go and have a look at the Cathedral.

I want to see the city full of people again and for Christchurch to have

its identity back. I’m concerned that if the Cathedral goes we are not going to be Christchurch any more. Even if it’s just like a memorial no one uses or goes near, I still think it’s important that we have it there.

I’m not saying this because I’m religious, I am not a churchgoer, I

just think there must be something there, surely. Hopefully we haven’t

gone through all this only to find there is nothing at the other end. It

is the one place that has always been identified as the icon of this city.

The City Council’s got it on their logo for goodness sake. It is us. And

when I hear them say they want to pull it down, I think, how can you, how can you entertain that. I know it’s with the church. I know that

the church owns it and the church doesn’t want to or can’t afford to

18

do it, but you see the letters in the paper, all these people who want to save it and saying there would be worldwide interest in a request for donations and expertise. And I believe it. I’m sure there would

be people that would contribute for Christchurch, to be able to keep something that identifies this place as us. I really do. We once had a beautiful city with some beautiful buildings and if you pull everything

down that’s old—I know we have to keep people safe—but we will lose our individuality, we will give up the city that we were. Who we are will be gone forever.

Daryl and I got married in Elizabeth House, which has already

been pulled down. I’m struggling with that. I’ve done a lot of my family history and I had made a list—a to do list—to go around to all of the churches where my ancestors got married. Well, I never ever did

it, and of course I really regret that now. Two or three of them, more, have already gone so that’s a regret I’ll live with for quite a while. The fact that it’s important to me is another reason why I don’t think I

could ever leave Christchurch. This place is our place and it has too

much of a hold on our family to ever leave. I have a real sense of that.

We’ve all worked really hard over the generations to make a life here, from living in a little cottage on the side of the river to building a city.

My family has helped to make it what it is—what it was. And if that’s

what it takes again, to help make it a city worth living in once more, then we will play our part. I don’t know how… I’m not sure amongst all

this mess what exactly we might do, perhaps just to stay. Yeah. Maybe

just by staying… maybe that’s the one thing we can all do, is to stay.

Stay. Not leave.

19