Welcome to Tokyo: So, are you ready for the Big One?

There's a lot to do in order to get settled when you move to the other side of the planet.

Find an apartment, unpack all your stuff, buy furniture ... and, if you've moved to Japan, make sure your new pad has an earthquake survival kit.

That would include water, flashlights, canned food, a first aid kit … the list goes on.

Yup, there is a very real and scary need here to be prepared in the event Tokyo gets hit by the proverbial "Big One."

I took a peek at the Japan Meteorological Agency's website. Here's what it says: "Located in one of the most active seismic and volcanic zones in the world, Japan is frequently affected by earthquakes and volcanic disasters."

Umm ... OK. 

The site also lists every earthquake that happens in or around Japan. In the seven-day period before this writing, there have been more than 50 small earthquakes with magnitudes ranging from 1 to 4.

With that in mind, I think about Tokyo, where I will be working for the next two years. I am on loan to Japan's public broadcaster NHK through a training program with the CBC. 

The greater Tokyo area, with its population of 37 or so million people, sits atop not one fault line, but three.

This is a city just biding its time before the inevitable.

Let's go to the simulation centre

A recent visit with my other CBC Tokyo colleagues to an earthquake simulation center really drove home the concept of doom approaching.

I learned that the Big One could hit at any moment. It will be scary and much worse than anything I am capable of imagining.

The centre, though, does a great job of trying to paint the horrible picture.

We were brought through a mock disaster-stricken neighbourhood, and were then given stats on the region's earthquakes. Then we were given tips on how to survive for 72 hours — the time it would probably take to get actual help from emergency professionals.

We also watched a video that showed a chilling here's-what-it-would-look-like-scenario of Tokyo post-earthquake. Buildings on fire or destroyed, streets filled with people, lots of screaming and crying.

We were told that if the Big One strikes Tokyo during the day, there will be eight million people stranded without a way home.

All those people would be left trying to navigate through the destruction before they could get home to see if their loved ones were OK or not.

Then there was a video showing crash test dummies in earthquake simulation rooms as they cranked up the magnitude in each scene. At its highest, furniture bounced around and toppled over, crushing the poor dummy who was lying on the floor. I left feeling educated but ill.

Earthquakes on the brain

It's like the thought of "what if?" — or rather "when?" — is always hanging over you in Tokyo, especially so when you are under a giant freeway in a cab.

You look up thinking "I'm almost out from under all those tonnes of concrete that are just waiting to come crumbling and crashing down."

I don't think I am alone in my thoughts either. People seem to talk about earthquakes a lot here. Granted it could be something that happens when you're a newbie. It's like talking about the weather in Newfoundland just in a morbid sort of way.

In my new newsroom at NHK, we do earthquake-related stories almost on a daily basis. Most of them are related to the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami that killed close to 16,000 people.

We did one the other day though about shoring up the walls of Hiroshima's Peace Memorial to make it more earthquake-proof. A shell of a building that managed to survive an atomic bomb blast still needs extra support if it's going to stick around.

I've been told that there will be some amount of a warning before an earthquake hits. Apparently phones, TVs and buildings all have alarms that will let me know to get under a table.

It may be a minute, it may be 10 seconds, but it will be a warning nonetheless.

All that being said, I still get up out of bed each day with a happy outlook because thinking about the "what ifs?" and the "whens?" too much could drive me crazy.

But it doesn't mean I won't try to be prepared.

As I was getting ready to move into my new apartment, I ensured that getting an earthquake survival kit was at at the top of my list.