最中に and うちに differences


So this sentence appeared in my grammar book:

> パーティーの__地震が起こり、会場は大騒ぎになった。

It says the correct thing to write in the blank space is 最中に. Which would
roughly translate the sentence to "Just as the party was going on, an
earthquake occurred, and the venue changed into an uproar".

While I understand why 最中に is a correct answer, I don´t quite understand why
うちに can't also be used. I thought that besides using うちに like の前に, it could be
also be used as 間に。




There are two reasons.

  * Unlike ～の間に, it seems that ～のうちに cannot be directly used with nouns that denote an event. (As long as it's used with the noun that denotes a time span, it can be very short)

>     * 今年のうちに／今日のうちに／7月のうちに／夏のうちに
>     * 朝のうちに／午前のうちに／日中のうちに
>     * 夏休みのうちに／オリンピックの開催期間のうちに
>     * 小学生のうちに／子供のうちに
>     * 一瞬のうちに
>     * [*]番組のうちに／[*]コンサートのうちに／[*]オリンピックのうちに

Your sentence should at least be パーティーが終わらないうちに or パーティーをやっているうちに.

  * Unlike ～の間に, うちに has the nuance of "no later than ～ ends" rather than "in the midst of". In other words, when one says うちに, there is usually a "deadline" in his mind. But such nuance is not necessary in this case.

>     * 子供のうちに勉強をしておきましょう。
>     * 鉄は熱いうちに打て。 Strike while the iron is hot.

