日本大地震

By this point, everyone probably knows that a truly massive earthquake hit Japan today.

Rationally, I know that Japan is in a good place to deal with such events. Emotionally, I can't imagine the devastation and the scale of the disaster. These pictures are astounding.

I lived in Japan. My life changed because of Japan. Parts of me that I will never get back are still there and even as my kanji fades and my ability to speak dwindles down to levels of nothingness... it's always going to be in my life. It will always have a hold on me.

Thank god monkeybobert is okay, because I spoke to her yesterday while morose and I would have hated to have had that be our last conversation. Everyone else I know seems to be all right. My host family lives in a suburb of Kyoto, and apparently Kansai is in relatively good shape.

Tonight I'll try to find Aki and Tomoko on facebook. I've needed to do that for a long time.

Edit: Unsurprisingly, the BBC has much better coverage of this than CNN. Here's a link to live streaming reporting. God bless you, Britain.