As I noted on twitter earlier, I experienced my first earthquake today.  Nothing too exciting – I was in the computer room at the office and when I realized that the room actually was moving, I grabbed my phone and ran outside with my co-workers (who were, again, watching Brazilian soap operas in the kitchen).  I think the shaking only lasted about five seconds.

Sean was in a church in Vale, a nearby village, with several of his co-workers, attending a service for an Orthodox holy day.  My host mom was outside and saw everyone running outside their homes, confused.  My host brother thought it was our washing machine going into spin cycle.

A 5.8 earthquake hit near Kutaisi, which by public transportation is about three hours away from us but how the crow flies is much closer.  The epicenter was in an uninhabited area, and so far no casualties have been reported, thankfully.  (If you’re interested, here’s a short news piece about it.)

I have to give props to the Peace Corps staff, who sent out a volunteer-wide text message about the earthquake about 15 minutes after it happened.  I actually told my co-workers the details, rather than vice-versa!

This is the only damage I’ve seen from the earthquake so far:

-- Paint chips from the ceiling on our desk --