The Place We Are Together – Jay McLeod

The Place We Are Together Jay McLeod

And Kindness Lay All About

Stories from the Christchurch Earthquakes

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Glenn Busch

Jay McLeod

We were friends at school although I was a couple of years older, but we always knew each other. When we started seeing each other seriously I must have been about twenty-one and Rebekah was what, nineteen. Born here in Christchurch I lived with my mum for

most of my early years and then in my teens I went to live with my

grandparents at Sumner. Being by the water there I got into surfing and that’s where I met the Sumner crowd. At the same time I was going to Linwood College and got to know a lot of good people

there, people I’m still close to. I started flatting from quite a young

age, just doing various jobs until I was twenty-three. That’s about the time I started thinking I should probably do something with my life.

I did a Bachelor of Science Degree in Geography at university and

when I’d finished it I went on and did some post graduate training in

IT. After that we got on a plane and went to London. We went for four years and it was a fantastic time in our lives. We made a lot of

good friends there, travelled around Europe together and ended up making our vows on a beach in Cyprus. We had no family with us

but there were friends from London and Simon, my old mate from

Sumner, had just turned up as well. He and his partner Sarah were on the beach with us that day, our only friends from home.

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For a time we found it hard to decide what to do. We loved London

but should we stay there or return home? About a year or so after our

marriage we came back to Christchurch for a holiday and being back here, seeing friends and family again, it reminded me of how much I

liked the city and how much we missed everyone. We thought—I’m saying we again—I, I could see myself coming back. Rebekah may have

had different ideas but I was excited about it, the idea of coming home.

I think it’s because we were born here. It’s your home, your place,

and that’s something I’ve always found hard to let go of. When we began to think of moving overseas, I was like no, no, I don’t want to do

it. I just want to stay here in Christchurch. I don’t want to leave this city. Once we had left I was fine. But coming back on holiday, that

changed it all again. The thing I loved about the place was that nothing had changed. That’s what I like. I don’t like change, as Rebekah will

tell you. It was good to come home. Same city, same friends, family, everybody still in the same place. The things I loved hadn’t changed at

all. There were a few new things that had popped up in the city while we’d been gone but they were really cool and that was okay too.

We found work. It took me longer than Rebekah to find something

but eventually I did. I’m still there. Then we found our house. It was built in the thirty’s so it’s an old character home, which is the reason

we moved to Avonside. It was a great neighbourhood and full of the

kind of houses that we wanted to buy. Home—having a home—means

a lot to me. It’s a place where you feel safe, where your family feels safe.

I mean I really love coming home every day from work; I do, I look

forward to it every day, coming home and seeing my wife and my little

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boy. That’s what makes it a home isn’t it. Not so much the physical

structure, but the place where everything is important to you. I thought

I would be there for life; I planned the school that our boy might go to.

We talked about everything we would do with the house. It was magic.

A dream come true. Except that within a very short time the dream turned into a nightmare. In the end it wasn’t even two years.

It was an earthquake; we knew that, so naturally we jumped out of

bed got under the doorframe in the bedroom. Except it kept going on

and we were like, okay, is this the place to be? No. We just ran then, into the dining room and threw ourselves under the table. Rebekah

was nearly nine months pregnant at the time so it was an experience all right. She was freaked out. She was scared, I don’t know if I was or

not. I don’t think so because it happened so quickly. I do remember us

both sitting under the table and wondering when it was going to finish.

Then once it did stop you could hear car sirens and everything going off in the darkness.

The power was cut off so we couldn’t see a thing. I jumped out

from underneath the table but Rebekah wasn’t going anywhere. She

seemed fine but she was still worried. We had grabbed the cat that

had totally freaked out so he was under the table with Rebekah; they stayed under there together. I walked outside, out the back, and could

see all this liquefaction. There was enough light to see that. I studied geography at university so I knew basically what it was and I was kind

of excited. Rebekah was screaming out for me to come back inside, get under the table, and I’m out there with my headlamp on looking at all this liquefaction going, ‘Wow, this is amazing!’ I’d obviously never

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seen it first-hand before. Then like everybody else we started trying to contact friends and family. That didn’t work too well, the system was gridlocked.

I think if you had an analogue phone, which my grandparents

had, you had more chance. I did eventually manage to call them with my mobile and they were okay. Basically, like everybody, they were just waiting till it got light so you could actually see the extent of

the damage. So, we waited too. Sleep now was the last thing on our

minds. We were concerned about other people, friends and family.

Not a lot of things were broken inside, a couple of glasses maybe.

But the actual house itself, in one particular corner, the baby room

that we were doing up for the arrival of Lucas, there was a lot of cracking there. The age of the house with its lath and plaster meant

there was a lot of cracking in his bedroom. That was obviously a bit disappointing, just a month out from him being born. Then there was the liquefaction. We had about ten cubic metres of liquefaction

to remove from the section and that was all mainly in the backyard.

Also the house itself had moved. There was probably a two-inch gap between the foundation and the house in one corner.

Once it became light we drove to a friends’ place. They’re also in

Avonside, in fact they’re just around the corner. The weird thing was that in our street, Retreat Road, all was in chaos. I mean there was

liquefaction everywhere. But when we got to our friends’ place they

had hardly any damage at all. We were like, did this earthquake just

happen in our street? They’d had a couple of things fall over, but no liquefaction or anything. Later we made our way up Linwood Ave to my

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grandparents in Brookhaven and we were amazed—with the severity

of the shaking we thought it would be a lot worse than it appeared to be. Their place was fine. We had a shower there and something to eat.

Back home there was no power and we’d lost the sewerage. We

went to stay for a bit with our friends in Avonside who still had power.

I work in the city and the building I work in had to be inspected before

I could go back to work so I got started on the liquefaction. After a

while I began to realise just how much there was but then a friend who had hired a digger, a small Bobcat, came around and cleaned up the rest for me.

Funnily enough we weren’t that worried about the house because

we thought surely they’d fix it up. I mean it wouldn’t be a big deal

once we got rid of the liquefaction. It was like a one-off thing. We’ll

clean up and we’ll get on with it. Somebody would come in, fix up the house and that would be it. We didn’t understand the severity of it. We didn’t realise that we were prone to it happening again. There’s no way

we ever thought there’d be another earthquake, so yeah, we would just carry on with life as normal.

That wasn’t to be. The next earthquake arrived just a few months

after Lucas did. Because of the time it struck I was at work. We were

in a four-storey building over the road from the hospital, in Oxford

Terrace. It was a much more frightening experience than September.

The intensity of the shaking and being in a high-rise building—I mean it completely trashed our office and as soon as we could, we all

evacuated. I was trying to phone Rebekah first off but of course the

mobiles were not working. The whole mobile network was jammed

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up again. When I did get through to her, the first thing she said was

that there is a fountain of water coming up out of the ground in the

front of our house. So, more liquefaction coming up, she said there were fountains all over the place so she just picked up Lucas, grabbed what she could and jumped in the car. I don’t even think she locked

the door. Just jumped in the car and said I’m coming to get you, which

in hindsight probably wasn’t a great idea. What would normally have been a trip of a few minutes took over an hour.

Meanwhile we were all standing outside our building at work.

Then there were more aftershocks and so we moved across the street to stand next to the trees rather than the buildings, we thought it

would be safer. Being we were right near the hospital we were seeing vehicles coming past with injured people on the back of them. Cars

going all over, it was just random. When Rebekah finally got to me we thought we would make our way to Brookhaven again, to my

grandparents. Honestly, it was crazy; it took something like four or five hours to get just the few kilometres from Oxford Terrace to

Brookhaven. It wasn’t a pleasant trip, especially with a four-monthold baby screaming in the back seat. Poor Lucas, he was hungry and he was strapped into his car seat, which wasn’t a nice experience for him, not for that amount of time.

For myself, I think shock was the main thing. How could this

happen again and at that point we didn’t even know the severity of it, just what we’d seen. Then we got to Brookhaven and realised how

bad it was there compared to September. We had no idea where the epicentre was; I suppose we just thought it came from out Darfield way

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again, like the last one. But this time Brookhaven was hit quite hard and when we got there my grandparents had a lot of damage. Then watching the news—they still had power then—we began to see how terribly bad it really was. We began then to think about our own place and whether we’d have a place to go back to at all.

Rebekah though our place might be totalled but I was pretty

keen to get back to it. It was quite dark by the time we eventually got there. There was no power so I think there was a discussion

about whether we could stay there but the front door was buckled and we couldn’t close it, and I wasn’t very happy to leave the place

unsecured. We didn’t do much that night, moved Lucas’s cot into our bedroom and went to sleep.

When we woke up the next day I looked around trying to assess

the damage. We had a portable radio that we used to keep up with what was happening. It wasn’t good news and I was attempting to think about what we did from here. Rebekah had just run out the

door when it happened and there was a lot of stuff that had fallen

over after she’d left. There was a bit to clean up and so I suppose

that’s the first thing you do, try to get things a bit tidy. You kind of want to make the house look liveable again don’t you. I mean there

was a lot more cracking to the plaster inside. The walls were now

buckled and you couldn’t do much with the interior doors. None of them would close anymore and you did feel that on one side of the

house you were walking downhill. A lot of the piles had given up.

Even so, you still wanted to kind of stay there. I think inside me was

a feeling of disappointment that such a thing could happen again,

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but I was still holding on to the idea that the house could be repaired and we would continue to live in our home.

I so much wanted to stay there. Even after the earthquakes in

June. Even after the second one that same day pretty much emptied

everything onto the floor, even after the liquefaction once more

surrounded us, even then, I was still thinking surely our house won’t be red zoned. I held on tight to the idea that we could stay there, that they

would be able to repair the house. This was our home and I was going

to stay there for as long as I could. It wasn’t until I logged on to the CERA website that I realised it might not be happening. I found our

address and it came up red. That was the moment when I went, okay; maybe we won’t be staying here after all. I mean you heard stories of

Avonside pretty much being bulldozed and turned into like a park or something—that’s what we were hearing—but I still wasn’t willing to

believe it. I still wanted to hold on to the idea that we could stay in our home forever. Yeah… it wasn’t to be.

I was upset. I think I was a lot more upset than Rebekah about

leaving the house. I thought that we would buy a house—Rebekah

always laughs about it when I talk like this—but you know, I bought the house thinking I’d be there until I retired. I had never given

any thought to the fact that we might move out and certainly never thought of wanting to move out. Like this was my own home and I was

going to stay there for as long as I could. And once Lucas came along I’m talking about him going to school and then which high school he might go to, and Rebekah’s saying, ‘Well, you know, we probably won’t be in this house then, so no point thinking about what high school he’s

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going to.’ I mean that’s just how I viewed it, which is probably why in this whole experience, from September to now, losing our home was my biggest disappointment.

That’s what I felt, but okay, as the man of the house you have to start

thinking the family needs to be looked after. What are we going to do now? We need to start looking for a new home. You do still feel that

sense of responsibility. I’m not saying there’s any difference in equality

between Rebekah and I, I don’t mean that, I just wanted to make sure my family were really safe… I wanted to make them feel safe.

Once we’d found out we were red zoned we pretty much got out

in the market straight away, looking for a for another home. You had

the two options. Take the government offer of a buyout, or go with the insurance. In the end we took the government offer, which meant we were in a position to pretty much purchase another home straight

away. We thought it was a good idea because the way things were

going, with the housing shortage and so on, it was becoming more and more difficult to buy a home in Christchurch. We wanted to stay here but obviously we wanted to move to an area that we hoped was

going to be less prone to what we’d experienced. Thinking of the future I wanted to find a house in a good suburb and obviously an area where there was good schooling for Lucas.

What happened was we had a friend of a friend who is a real estate

agent for Harcourts. He came to see us and asked us where we wanted to live in the city. We outlined all the areas but we were thinking

ideally of looking south of the city. We were still thinking of character homes. Beckenham, Opawa, St Martins, those sorts of places, but then

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we found those areas weren’t looking so great anymore. West of

the city had not been so affected but I’ve always lived out east and

never been a big fan of the west. So north, we liked St Albans. We

even played with the idea of moving further north to like, Pegasus, that new sub-division, and drove all the way out there one day. I guess the idea of a new build, warm, kind of open, you know, no

maintenance, not having to paint it every so many years or whatever, had its attractions. But then we thought of the drive, the one road in

and out, the traffic and so on and again we came back this way and started looking around St Albans.

The Harcourts agent wanted to show us this house and I said no, no.

I didn’t want to look at it. Summerhill stone everywhere; it wasn’t my style of house at all. But he’s like, ‘Just have a look at it. Get a feel for

different places instead of just looking at something you think you’ll

want straightaway. This is a great size section. It’s a good price. It’s in a

great schooling zone for Lucas.’ So, we came. We had a look. Rebekah and I are walking around and we’re looking at each other, both of us I think pleasantly surprised with what we are seeing. We put in an

offer the next day and they said yes. They were an elderly couple that

had lived here and so the gardens were well established. They kept the

garden nice. I think that’s what got us, the place had been kept so well, you could tell they cared about it. We were like, oh, this is cool and

when we thought about it we did like the idea of permanent material.

To move in all we had to do was repaint and recarpet, plus there was

heaps of potential. We felt we’d got the house at a good enough price that we could actually afford to do quite a bit to it. Put our own stamp

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on the house. So now we were here in the new house and it was a great

place, but, you know, I couldn’t help myself, I was still thinking back to what if… what if we were still in Avonside.

So we did a bit. We painted a room, we recarpeted. Other than

that, we haven’t done much else to it. The previous owners had put in

claims for everything but the Earthquake Commission hadn’t actually assessed the place since the first big one in September. Naturally we

had structural engineers check it over and clear everything before we

bought it. We had to do that to get insurance. But despite all that, when the EQC did finally come through and look over the house they told us the floors were out of kilter slightly, as in not level. I mean just by looking at it you wouldn’t have any idea that the floor wasn’t

perfectly horizontal. Still, the EQC said it was out by just enough that they had to report it and to fix it would be over the cap. Because the

floor is a concrete slab and the walls, the cladding, are solid, it would be

easier to rebuild. So now Rebekah and I were looking at each other and

shaking our heads, we just couldn’t believe it. Surely not our second home as well.

In fact if they do rebuild it, may be it’s a win, but the first thing

that came to my mind is where are we going to go for all that time.

While they’re rebuilding it. It’s yet another upheaval and our life gets disrupted yet again. On the other hand, Rebekah, she’s thinking, oh beaut, that’s fantastic. She probably thinks a bit more positively than I do, so she was happy with it the idea. Now we’re waiting to receive the report, as are most people with EQC. I’m not sure that we’re much of a priority. So that’s where we are now with this place.

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Yes, and then there was Christmas, the December earthquake. It

was my last day at work before we finished up for the festivities. It was going to be a nice day. We were all having a drink and something

to eat in the office, everybody was happy and looking forward to a

wee break. Then, yeah, all that was rudely interrupted because it was happening again.

Pretty much everyone scarpered. At least everyone left the building.

I phoned home to make sure Rebekah and Lucus were okay. Once

we got outside I was standing with a colleague of mine who had been

living overseas. This was his first one, he’d missed all the others. He

was just standing there not knowing what to do. Our office is right

next door to the Pegasus Arms pub so I looked at him and said, ‘Okay, let’s go and have a pint.’ Rebekah and I had been going to meet friends

there for a drink later that afternoon, but of course that didn’t happen.

When I got home the TV was lying down on the floor and

Rebekah’s mum was here, she’d come to be with Lucas. But rather

than go to the pub our friends came over to our place and we had drinks here. I guess we just kind of thought, hey, it’s Christmas, let’s

not let this get us down. And we didn’t. We had a good time and woke up the next day feeling a bit the worse for wear. Nothing at all we could blame on the earthquake.

To be honest with you, with all that’s happened, if we didn’t both

have jobs in Christchurch and we didn’t have a mortgage, I think we

would leave the city. I don’t like to say that because I’m born and bred here and so is Rebekah and I’ve always said that I would never leave. I

guess I’m feeling fed up with it, the way that everything is taking such

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a long time. We’re not seeing anything. No great changes are being

made and it just looks like nothing’s happening so that’s where the

feeling of wanting to leave comes from. And still in the back of your mind you don’t know if there is going to be another big one of the same

sort of magnitude. Your never… you’re not confident any more that that’s the end of it. December seemed to prove that.

We went up north for a holiday at Christmas, up to the Coromandel

and Auckland. The weather was lovely and we were both thinking wow, we could live up here. This is very nice. I think if we were going to

move it would be to another city and if we did move to another city it would be Auckland. That’s probably our preferred city of all of the

major centres in New Zealand. Except of course, it won’t happen. We have friends and family here, we have a mortgage and we do have jobs here. Plus we are still waiting for the EQC report to decide what will

happen with our home. So, no, we won’t be leaving. All of which doesn’t

mean we’re not frustrated. I mean, there are things to do in the city but it’s just not the same. I’ve seen various plans for what they want to do with the city and I think they’re great. What I don’t understand is what

the hold-up is on knocking these buildings down and getting on with

it. I’m sure there are some obvious reasons but I mean you feel like

you’re being kept in the dark. I’d have to say I’m not the hugest fan of the Christchurch City Council at the moment. I think they could have

done a lot more to keep us in the loop and I think they could have been a lot more sensitive to people in Christchurch with regards to their needs. Bob Parker might have been the right man for the job up to this

point but yeah, I just wish they would keep us in the loop a bit more.

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There seems to be a lot of politics involved when really all the people of Christchurch want to see is some progress.

The truth is I used to have a great attachment to this city and I don’t

really have that any more. Maybe it’s because we don’t have an inner city anymore. Maybe it’s that all those cool places I used to go to no

longer exist. Whatever it is, I don’t really have the same bond any more.

I find myself hating certain things about this city now and a couple of

years ago I would never have said that. I suppose I just like the idea

of having a whole city. Of having places to go. I mean if we wanted to live in a place where there was nothing to do we would have moved out to the country. It was always a nice thought, to come home on a

Friday night thinking I’ve got the weekend ahead of me. What ‘s on.

What can we do in the city. Well, these days, not a lot. I think that’s

probably the major cause of people leaving. Yeah, that and I suppose

the fear of another earthquake. Plus the whole being in limbo thing, you know. Wanting to see some progress. Like I say, there’s some great ideas for the city. I just wish it would all speed up a bit, get in and get those things done.

We still have family and our friends who are great and when I’m

having a cuss at the city it’s never about them it’s always about the

city itself. What’s happening or not happening with the city. As for

the future, well, it would be nice to witness the changes taking place. I suppose that’s a positive aspect of staying in the city. It would be nice to be here for that. Getting on with the house, making it feel more like a home for us, that will probably be my main focus really. With the

earthquakes ongoing, I guess they make you think more about your

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family, how much they mean to you. I’m not worried about my own safety but it would be nice just to keep them in a bubble so nothing

could ever happen to them; that they’d just keep on living a long and healthy life.

When you hear about terrible things like the small child who was

killed by a television falling on him, that really brings it home. When

you have a small child of your own, those sorts of stories can get into your head. There is always that fear for his safety and also all our

friends and family. The thing is not to dwell on it, try to keep it from

the forefront of your mind. I mean you have to live, you have to exist, and if I sat here thinking about all the things that could happen to Rebekah and Lucas and the possibility of more earthquakes, well, you’d just never do anything would you. But yeah… what you ultimately

come to grips with, in the most powerful way, is how much your family means to you. All that shaking rams it home more passionately, more intensely, than maybe you’ve ever realised before. You can do without

a job. You can do without your house. But there’s no way I could ever

imagine being without Rebekah and Lucus. My wife and son. No way.

Never. As long as we are still together everything will be okay.

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