Hope a year and a half later

It’s hard to imagine what you are looking at: how could it be that only a year and a half ago the ocean didn’t lap the road? The area of Higashi Matsushima, just thirty kilometers of Sendai, the biggest city in northern Japan, has sunk at least three feet into the ocean. It’s down a gravel road that I first lay my eyes on the unfathomable, little islands in a marshland that reveal themselves as broken homes.

The Japanese government has set up three zones to designate the major disaster areas: blue, yellow and red. In the blue zones, any homes destroyed can be either fixed or rebuilt. The yellow areas only allow the houses to be fixed but no houses are to be rebuilt there. The red zone won’t allow houses to be rebuilt there nor fixed, even if they were left standing.

Just recently it was decided that the area around Watanabe-san’s house, which was hovering between red and yellow, could be classified as yellow.

Watanabe-san and his wife were at home when the earthquake struck. When a tsunami warning was issued he and his wife only had time to move upstairs to the second floor. They were lucky. The brackish water that swept in from the river and the ocean, just a stone’s throw from their front door, and left behind crushed oyster shells, a pooh bear doll, blue and white printed tea cups, and disaster, spared the top floor.

There neighbors, an elderly couple who tried to escape by car, weren’t as lucky.

Now instead of relocating, Watanabe-san has decided courageously to brave the elements and fix the home on the land he and his ancestors have grown up. His family is oyster farmers by trade and this is where they have always worked. Behind his house are what at first appears to be rows of white build materials but upon a close look is ropes and ropes of oyster shells.

An energetic elderly man, who I instantly liked when my eyes fell on his weathered face and he exclaimed that he was happy to have us but admitted to not speak a word of English, he later explained the shells. Every year, beginning in November and lasting until April, the oysters are harvested as a delicacy tourists will come from all over Japan to eat. Millions of oysters are pulled from the sea so in order to ensure that the oyster’s continue to be bountiful, the shellfish farmers, place these ropes of shells back in the ocean for baby oyster’s to grow big and strong to be eaten the following year.

I gazed at the beautiful shells, shades of white to red, and couldn’t help but smile. For Watanabe-san, life has gone on and he has made the best of a situation. This is evident in the tea, and handmade donuts he serves, the udon noodles his wife makes us on the second day and the swing set he’s made for his two year old granddaughter when she comes to visit.

It was easy to forget, with all this hospitality, that we are not here to be pampered, but here in this little community at the edge of the sea, to help him start rebuilding. Surrounded by the water, salt decaying trees unlucky enough to have found their new home flooded, and the pine clad islands that Matsushima is famous for, we are looked over by a small shrine built for the god of the ocean as we gut Watanabe’s home.

Inside there is a grey mark all around the walls, like a ring in a bath tub, well over my head which is as high as the water rose. The windows in the bottom floor are long gone and tarps keep out the gentle sea breeze as I take a hammer to the dry wall and spend a day ripping the walls away to wood frame. The walls, doors, window, and floor board all have to go so that later a carpenter can come along and replace it all so it can be lived in again.

Close to the floor, between the walls, is clogged with tsunami dust, and I found small treasures of a pet bottle filled with the black water that failed to destroy this survivor of a house, a pink lighter, mostly empty, and a wedge or wrapped camembert cheese that no one much  feels like eating.

The first day I work with a small group of foreigners that traveled up together but the following day we are joined by new Japanese friends so that the air is filled with dust and scatter of Japanese and English as Watanabe-san’s house bridged the gap between us.

We worked for an organization called Habitat for Humanity. It’s a non-profit organization that helps out in countries of need to build houses. The division in Japan began ten years ago but after the disaster on March 11, 2011, it got its first chance to go to work in its own country. A chance no one could have hoped for. But still, it’s an amazing organization to volunteer for and we made quick friends with the staff who were kind admirable people who swapped between Japanese and English with as much ease as they handed out tasks to get families back on their feet.

 

On the second day they had a team head to one of the islands to help a family move out their belongings so the entire house can be raised about a foot so that it is livable again. The family will move back in November thanks to Habitat for Humanity and my hard working friends.

A weekend of tearing away dry wall, cleaning, taking down anything rotted and having our hearts warmed by Watanabe-san, lead me to have a quiet moment sitting by the ocean beside the little shrine. The red gate shone magnificently in the amazing sunlight that had sunlight streaming through the clouds in a way you only imagine in movies. I tried to find the word for this place and could only think of the beauty. Despite disaster, the Watanabe’s have retained their little corner of paradise. Behind me I hear the laughter of the group, entertained by the elderly man that radiates spirit, and know first hand there is hope.

 

 

 

On the final day, the day we were set to head home, we returned to Matsushima to take in the beauty to the bay of pine islands from a vantage point above the sea. It was hard to imagine devastation in such a beautiful place. After we journeyed into the little town for a brief walk down a path that led to a temple. It was lined with these tall trees and caves with carving from hundreds of years ago all dappled in a cool sunlight. It was the perfect ending to an incredible experience.

And then it was a long trip home south, through Tokyo, past the new sky tree in our huge bus to Gotenba where we parted ways and hope to meet again to go help up north maybe next month!

And now the days are cool and it's autumn again. How time flies. To think it was a year and a half ago I was awoken by Nikki telling me about the earthquake. I'm so glad that I cam when I did. I'm so glad I braved the fears of the time. And I'm so glad I got the chance to volunteer.

Life of a September

September brought many things. Mostly busy things. And so it is now at the end of the month I'm writing this post. Partially because I've been busy and partially because September was not up to the exciting speed of the rest of the months. I'm now a little broke so travel has become a bit more difficult and without travel I'm less inspired to shoot photos. There is the exception of next weekend, when Kevin, another ALT from Fujiyoshida, Lica, and I will travel north to Tohoku but this is less about sightseeing and more about volunteering with a program to help with whatever we can in the disaster areas. I'm hoping for a good experience and don't know yet what to expect but I'm glad I'm finally getting the opportunity!

Anyways, back to September. I'm pretty sure the month started with a part at the American pub in Fujiyoshida with my friends and saw a fun weekend of socializing and shopping. The days slowly grew less hot and my little vine flowers started to blossom at last and every morning I'd awake to a new colour; it was a pleasant surprise every morning. But the days were still too hot for them to thrive and by nightfall they had wilted. My rice grew slowly but began to show signs of being ready and I ate three tomatoes in a salad from my garden. So following will be my scattered memories of September.

I recall now a little festival at the little shrine by the station. And I walked their in the cooling evening to the sound of music. Colourful lanterns were strung up around the shrine placing it in it's own little world for the evening. Lanterns are my favourite and I am thoroughly convinced that if only the world was only to be lit up with lanterns it would be a better place! They were so beautiful and the main reason I was lured there that evening to watch a talent show of the community.

But perhaps I have jumped a head for as I try to remember that night, I remember my hand being swathed in bandages which brings up the next story. I was supposed to climb Mt. Fuji with Chelsea on the second weekend of September but on Friday night, as I was preparing food for the trek I was washing a glass when it promptly came apart in me hand and sliced open the edge of my hand. A glared down at the pooling blood, called myself stupid several time, and rushed off to Kevin's only to bleed all over his doorstep as I called for help and pleasantly, he couldn't here what i was saying, told me it was okay to come in. At this point it was too difficult to let go of my hurt hand so I was reduced to banging on the door with my head until he came to my assistance, hurried me off to the hospital, and I got my first set of stitches while awake. Six black stitches would decorate my hand for the next two weeks spreading much speculation among my students and preventing me from climbing Fuji after all. Four weeks later, it looks like I'll have a little scar to remember my emergency in Japan! lol.

Side note, Kevin and I started an exercise routine where we were climbing Iwadonosan at least a couple of times a week. Since then I'm working on a healthier diet and working out once a day. It's been rewarding for I have a bit of extra energy these days (enough so that I started back on my novel that I had lay to rest after spilling milk on my computer) and the views from my mountain over Otsuki have been breathtaking.

On another weekend, Kevin, laura and I helped out with an English meeting at Nishina sensei's kindergarten, and I presented my trip to Canada. After we met up with Lena and Stuart at Nishina's house and he invited us into the tea room for matcha. It was a lovely rainy afternoon and could only be considered cozy in the little tatami room overlooking the river and Iwadonosan. I want one just like it when I grow up and am rich! It was really wonderful and was followed by dinner out and dessert and coffee.

I guess the last thing to note are the seven undoukai I attended every Saturday for three weeks. As a result, on a Wednesday, one of my favourite schools celebrated the hard work by going out for dinner at the French Japanese restaurant where each course was tiny but delicious and it took longer for each morsel of food to be described than eaten. It was really great though and in this beautiful tatami room surrounded by a lit up Japanese garden. And I came away with a friend in one of my younger teachers (later she and I would go to Fujiyoshida for parfait and have a wonderful time!) But, the main point being, sports days with my kids! It was as last year, that it was a day where the kids competed in ridiculous dangerous but fun games like a tire steal battle royal, and a game called 'omikoshi' which is portable shrine; one of the kids would ride on the shoulders of four other kids and run about attempting to steal one another's hats. There was also the tire chariot ride where they'd place a little kid with a hard hat on a tire and the big kids would drag him about. There were normal things like relay and tug-of-war also. And this funny race where two kids had to propel a box forward while inside of it like the wheels of a caterpillar. I spent a lot of time giggling until the grade fifth and sixers amazed me as always when they preformed acrobatics associated with a circus, over gravel, and built a forty kid pyramid!

So I think that sums of September. It came in like a heatwave and left with a little typhoon. Autumn definitely has days where it hints at its existence but overall it still feels like summer. I can't wait for the leaves to change and the morning frosts. Autumn is the best season!