1:00AM

Very early this morning, I got to experience yet another Taiwanese... custom, which made the Moon Festival a little more interesting. But I guess it was at 1:00am, so it’s technically the day after the Moon Festival. Anyway, I woke up to a small ringing noise coming from outside my room. Once I had woken up a bit more, I realized that my bed was shaking. I thought it was a little unsteady at first, but then I was still and it kept rocking at a normal pace! It took me a moment to realize that this could be an earthquake! So I did the only thing that seemed sensible: I crawled into the fetal position and squeezed my eyes tight shut and waited for it to be over, which wasn’t for another few minutes. You have to remember, this was at 1:00am and I wasn’t in my normal state of mind, if I was, I would have probably walked around a bit to see if I could keep my balance.

Anyway, it finished in a couple minutes and I was really freaked out. I was too scared to move because I thought that if I moved, my bed would shake and the whole thing would start over again. But I really had to go to the washroom and I didn’t want to get up out of fear of triggering another earthquake. So I carefully reached for my iPod, turned on some FM Static until I calmed down (Which was about halfway through their second album) then I got up to use the washroom, came back, finished the album and managed to get back to sleep.

I asked my host dad about it this morning when I woke up still alive. He said it was indeed an earthquake and it was about half an hour long (so I must have woken up near the end of it) and the core was in Hualien, where it was a 6.3 earthquake! He said it was 3.2 here. Then he asked if we get earthquakes in Canada, and I said that was my very first earthquake. Sure, throw a blizzard at me and I’ll be fine, but an earthquake at 1:00am and I freak out. For the first time, I was a little worried about living on the 13th floor where the vibrations were more intense. Still, I survived. Maybe I’ll be a little more prepared next time.