Big Aftershocks

There was a magnitude 5 shaker in Wakayama earlier this evening when we were in a liquor store – all the stacks of bottles started moving back and forth, which was not the most reassuring of circumstances. A large aftershock came about five minutes ago… It was also a mag 5 but it felt a lot stronger here and they’re predicting tsunamis this time. There’s an emergency broadcast running in English and Japanese… Our little island should be okay. My place is half a mile from the coast so we should be cool. The shitty thing about living on an island is that it isn’t covered in the news… They predict tsunamis in Wakayama, Mie, and Kochi, and we live somewhere in between that plot. I guess that’s what air raid sirens are for (well, that and North Korean missile strikes). Cell phone lines are congested so I can’t get through to friends in Nara. Interestingly enough, land lines are working just fine – so to people who don’t use hard-line phones at home anymore, now’s a time to reconsider.
Shit, now they’re telling everyone living “near the coast” to evacuate. Is that very responsible for an island nation? Then again, we sat though The Endless Summer II yesterday and I have absolutely no interest in finding out what a 20 foot wave looks like coming down my street.