Gah! I had written a response to this when my laptop crashed the other day and have only now remembered to come back ... been a little overwhelmed trying to keep up with events.

I'm so sorry to hear about the earthquake you went through. You're exactly right that the situation is very similar, I suppose that if we can't have the ideal of no one having this sort of understanding, the next best thing is to have such tragedies bring out the best in people.