Colombian Quake Strikes a Nerve in Southland

I spent most of last Monday writing an article about a local scientist’s experiment to track earthquakes.

The story was still on my mind when I got home that night. The phone rang. It was a friend from the East Coast, where I’d spent most of my life, telling me about the devastating earthquake in Colombia, which had hit the town where my grandfather and several other relatives live.

I’d never been affected by an earthquake. The next few days would be my initiation.

I quickly found my remote control and turned to CNN to find images of residents and rescue workers trying to dig people out of the rubble of ruined buildings. I felt a sense of dread and fear when I realized that those images were from Pereira, my father’s hometown and one of the cities near the epicenter of the magnitude-6 earthquake.

Knowing that my father would be frantic, I immediately called him in New York. I asked if he had heard from any of our relatives in Pereira. He said he couldn’t get through to them after having tried all night. I could tell that he was feeling desperate and helpless.

He wasn’t alone. Hundreds of thousands of Colombians throughout the country were waiting for word--any word--about their loved ones. Many here in Los Angeles tried calling the Colombian Consulate, but all officials there could do was take down their names and telephone numbers.

Meanwhile, the television images put wild thoughts in all of our minds. Each time I saw a person buried beneath the debris of a fallen building, I imagined that my 92-year-old grandfather was also trapped and waiting for someone to rescue him.

Tuesday came and went with more disturbing pictures and still no news from my relatives. Feeling guilty about not being able to be with my father, I called him several times that day.

The death count climbed to the hundreds, most in the neighboring city of Armenia. I got a selfish sense of relief from news reports that Pereira was not in as bad a shape as Armenia.

I could not even imagine the torture my father was going through, having to watch on television the death and destruction in the town that was his home for 35 years. My father, Jose, was born and raised in Pereira. My grandfather, Jesus, now shares a home there with my uncle, aunt and cousin.

In 1964, my father moved from Pereira to New York City, where he met my mother and raised me and my two siblings. Although he loves his native land, he was determined to raise his children elsewhere, away from the poverty and the natural disasters he endured as a child. He wanted my grandparents to move to America, but they refused to leave the only city they had ever known.

My father frequently tells us about having to drop out of school to work for food in his lindo (beautiful) but impoverished Pereira.

It’s that endemic poverty that makes this disaster even more excruciating to witness. The people near the epicenter lived in buildings made with decaying concrete and shoddy materials. They had no chance against an earthquake like Monday’s.

They have no chance of recovering from it any time soon. Food and water are scarce, and thousands have been left homeless.

I’ve only been to Colombia once. In 1990, my father decided to take us to his hometown. He wanted us to see where he grew up. He wanted us to meet the family we knew only through pictures.

I remember Pereira as a quaint city that was as beautiful as my father described it. I remember my family’s cinder-block house with concrete floors. I remember buying a pair of white dress shoes in the central business district that now looks like a bomb was dropped on it. Never forget Pereira because that’s where your roots are, my dad told us over and over again as he led us through the city and relived his memories. This is where I sold empanadas (a pastry), he said as we stood on a street corner downtown.

I’ll never forget Pereira as it was when I walked through it in awe as a 13-year-old, and I’ll never forget Pereira as I saw it on television in shock hours after the quake.

Wednesday came with hundreds more casualties, more horrifying pictures and one piece of good news. My father had talked to a sister-in-law living in New York who heard from a friend of a friend in Colombia that my relatives had been spotted. It wasn’t a very good source, but it was good enough for him. I had a feeling many other worried relatives were getting similar unconfirmed reports.

Thursday came with even better news: My father was able to contact a close friend who had seen my relatives. They were alive, but their home was damaged.

My father’s friend didn’t fare as well. He’d had to bury his brother-in-law the day before, in one of the few coffins left in the city.

I flew east on Friday to be with my family. It would be a time to reflect together on the week. We’d keep watching the news reports. We’d keep reading the stories.

And we’d keep waiting to talk to our relatives, to finally hear their voices.