We had our first real earthquake here at 4:00 this morning. On the tenth floor you can't sleep through a 6.1 tremor. When I woke up I knew exactly what was happening. It was incredibly unnerving but over with in less than a minute, although my discomfort lasted quite a bit longer.

There was a devastating earthquake in Taiwan in 1999 and they've gotten very stringent about building requirements since then. I put my trust in those regulations being followed. What else can you do when you live in an earthquake zone? A lot of the damage from the 1999 quake was from mud slides in the mountains. They did heavy damage to the indigenous communities that live there and some of the roads in the region have never been reopened. The structural damage was almost all in old buildings. I'm glad they don't build them like they used to.

The plus side of a night-time quake is that I didn't have to worry about being in charge of a classroom of students. One of the faculty at KAS told me that during his first earthquake at school he just ran out of the building. You're supposed to have everyone hide under their desks and then calmly walk to a nearby field after the trembling stops. I think that means you're supposed to act like a responsible adult. I hope I can rise to the occasion if the need arises. I'm not holding out hope.