LIFE IN ’QUAKE AREA

Waikato Independent, Volume XXXI, Issue 2448, 5 March 1931, Page 6

LIFE IN ’QUAKE AREA

WOMEN SUFFER SUNBURN. .COOKING AND BATHING PROBLEMS. Women remaining in Gie earthquake stroa —there are many in Hastings, but only a few in Napier—wear straw lmts of the sombrero pattern now. After Hie earthquake people had little time to worry about the way they dressed, and women went about without hats for some days. A crop of freckled faces, shiny noses and peeling necks was the result, -for the weather has l )0 on hot almost every day since the shake. One girl was taken to the Hastings auxiliary hospital suffering from sunburn, and now people are paying more attention to the class of headgear worn. This little insight into the numerous difficulties that face the people in the earthquake area is contained in a letter from Hastings. One difficult problem is that of having a bath, for people are not allowed to enter houses unless a permit has been secured, and in any case the water Is not- on in many of them. In Napier the swimming baths are used, some people just having a daily bathe in the pool, while other queue up and wait their turn for a hot salt-water bath. Open-air Showers. Many people have improvised showers in trees by hanging buckets or kerosene tins in the boughs, arranging the ■appliance so that the pulling of a rope tips up the container and releases a refreshing cascade. It was hoped that gas supply would be restored in Hastings soon, but it will be some weeks before this is available ■again in Napier. In the meantime, open-air cooking is still the vogue. Some enterprising housewives have designed satisfactory stoves by. taking 'the top off the kitchen range and laying it on bricks, lighting the fire underneath. The psychological aspect of the position is now being- taken into account by the authorities, and efforts are being made to promote entertainments to take the minds of the people off the desolation around them and the huge task of rehabilitation that confronts them. Moving pictures are now being shown 'in McLean Park, Napier’s big football ■ground, w r herc the water that flooded it nt first has now been drained away. The Bluebirds, a company of Napier amateur performers, are being reorganised to give concerts in the relief ■ -camps. Cricket and Theatricals. Friendly cricket matches wore played in Hastings last week-end, but the "Napier ground, Nelson Park, now has great cracks in it as the result of furIhcT shakes, and play will not be possible there for some time. In Havelock North, amateur performers ■ played ‘ ‘ The Pirates of Pcnoaance.” Four motor-lorries wore drawn up together in the open to make the mtage, and the spoken parts in the -piece "were read, while the choruses, sengs, and music were given by a gramophone. .Hotels, which have been closed by •order of the authorities since the quake ■are now open for a few hours each day. Most businesses are now in operation •-again 'in temporary premises, and the • associated banks have opened in both town in large barn-like build ng; emit , of corrugated iron. The awful task of uncovering bodies is still going on. “Even now no one -can say what the ultimate death roll will "be,” the writer nays. “Advertisements arc still appearing in the papers "here for missing persons. It seems remarkable that people have not been located after being missing for three weeks, but it is a fact. Perhaps they .may be dead —no one knows.” .Enterprising Land Agents. 'The-writer says that many people in "both Napier and Hastings have ed circular letters from land and estate agents In other towns offering to sell their properties for them. A warning to residents not to be stampeded into sacrificing their properties has been “issued, and a committee of business -men set up to advise those desiring to •.sell. ' .'A member of the Hastings Citizens’ Committee deals with the question of regulating the influx of outside labour to assist in demolition and reconstruc-tion--work. “Thero seems to bo a feeling abroad that needlessly high barriers nave been erected against skilled tradesmen from outside,” the letter ■says. •' '“lt is well to bear in mind that the -woi ; k of clearing debris will be more or less finished in a week or two, and then there will be little or nothing to do till the actual work of permanent reconstruction begins. Hundreds of rnon who live here will then be unemployed. 44 To bring in outside men as "■well would only accentuate that position. • -“Then the coming of outsiders would

be a further drain on the food supply j system, and if those men came thcio is the fact that probably they would have to -work for no wages in any case, for few people have money to pay for labour here. “Because of these two facts it has been thought advisable to prohibit the entry of tradesmen at present, but a register of workers here is being prepared. If it is found that there is a shortage of ■workmen in any puiticului line outsiders will be given the opportunity to conic in and take the woik that is offering. In the meantime there seems to be enough men here now to do what is necessary.”