The City That Disappeared

Hello again, everyone!  I'm back from my second trip as a volunteer worker in Ishinomaki.  While I was there, I realized that I had forgotten something very important in my last blog post.  Honestly, I'm kind of ashamed and baffled that I forgot it since it can only be described as unforgettable (although, I was pretty rushed when I was writing my last post).

On the day that I left Ishinomaki for my first trip, we took a detour with Andrew, the man who runs the Samaritan's Purse base, to an evacuation center in a city called Minami Sanriku so that we could bring them fresh vegetables and clothes.

Minami Sanriku is one of the cities that, after the earthquake and tsunami, has been essentially wiped off the map.  Seeing this utter destruction was very hard and pictures alone can't convey the seriousness of it.  It looked like a war had happened there.

I went back to Minami Sanriku on my second trip, which I returned from last week.  By now, a number of people have moved out of the evacuation center (really just the local middle school's gymnasium) and into temporary housing facilities.  We delivered fresh produce and some meat to the roughly 50 families living there (again, this was Andrew's idea).  It wasn't much, but I think that they really appreciated it.  Afterwards, we went to the same evacuation center and sang some hymns (in Japanese) to the people staying there.  With virtually no Christian population there, not one of them had a clue what we were singing about, but I think that it was a comfort for them.  At the very least, it was something to break up the boredom of the day.

I'm writing about Minami Sanriku partially to convey the seriousness of the situation here in Japan and partially to help get over it myself.  Going there was upsetting for me, and I think that posting these pictures and telling people about it can help me.  Thank you for reading!  My ability to access the internet is a bit shaky right now, so this may be my last post until I return to the US.

 The evacuation center

This fishing boat is in a ditch half way up the mountainside

Ishinomaki Day 6 and Beyond

After such an eventful day on Sunday, the next day passed like a blur, so this post will be short.  I spent time sweeping the mud off of a sidewalk before the entire team got together to go all-out in mudding out a man's house.  We worked for at least four hours shoveling and hauling mud out and not much else.  But we got a lot done and were glad to put in a good day's work.

The day after that, we packed up and left for the eight hour ride back.  That also passed like a blur and before we knew it, we were back in Tokyo where I promptly went to sleep.  Going to Touhoku was really an amazing experience.  It's been exciting, depressing, and exhausting.  It wasn't what I would call "fun," but it was definitely a good thing to have done and I wouldn't want to have spent my summer any other way.

It's been about a month since I got back, and I'm currently doing the last minute preparations for another team.  The teams keep getting bigger with sixteen people for this one.  I'll be in the same area but probably doing different things.  The Mehns are going to America, so I'll be the only one who has had experience with this there.  I'll be gone for the next ten days.  I hope this trip will be as memorable as the first one!  Thank you for reading!

Ishinomaki Day 5

My fifth day was a Sunday, so we decided not to do physical work.  Even though I didn't pick up a shovel or even put on my boots that day, it was the most memorable and rewarding of all the time I spent working in Ishinomaki.

First, we went to Mr. Abe's church, Ishinomaki House of Prayer (Mr. Abe is the man in the video I posted earlier).  The church has about seven members, all of them elderly except for Mr. Abe's son.  Technically, the church doesn't have a pastor: Mr. Abe does everything a pastor does except preach, so he denies that he is one.  For the sermon, they listened to a recording of another preacher.  Afterwards, we had lunch and, in typical Japanese style, they were extremely gracious hosts.

After lunch, a non-Christian couple showed up.  We had been told that they had lost a son in the tsunami.  I don't think I've ever seen anyone quite like these two.  They looked totally hollow, like shells of the people they were.  They didn't talk, except for basic greetings.  One of the church members talked a little bit about her daughter, who also died in the tsunami.  She talked about how, even though she missed her daughter terribly and it hurt so much, that because they were both Christians, they would see each other again.  Towards the end, she was crying and I was having a hard time not doing the same.

Afterwards, we returned to Shintate and did prayerwalking.  Prayerwalking is exactly what it sounds like:  we would go to a person's house and pray for them.  We also prayed for Shintate in general: for physical healing and rebuilding and for a spiritual awakening and interest in the Gospel.

We split into two groups to pray since Dr. Mehn and Monica were going to deliver a box of clothes to a woman in the neighborhood, Mrs. Iseya.  After a while, my group went back to Mrs. Iseya's house to regroup.  Mr. and Mrs. Iseya, Dr. Mehn, and Monica were all standing outside and when they saw us approach, Mrs. Iseya ran up to me, grabbed my hands and bowed lower than I've ever seen a Japanese person bow.  She went to each of the team members and did this, constantly telling us thank you.  It was a bit surreal, since most Japanese people I've met are fairly reserved and those up north even more so.  But Mrs. Iseya was downright giddy!  She looked like she was holding back tears.  It's a bit difficult to describe in words, but this experience was had a huge impact on me.  It was like seeing the fruit of the work that we had put into the neighborhood finally come out.  That box of clothes was only about $50, but it made such a difference.

It seemed like after that, we ran into a lot of thankful people.  We stopped by the house of Mrs. Komatsu, which we had mudded out, and she happened to be around and thanked us.  We also went to another neighborhood called Watanoha (which means something like "where the waves cross over."  Sadly, that's very accurate), where a team from a Brazilian-Japanese church was working.  This team had worked like machines on one house, completely removing the ruined walls and mudding out the floor in one day.  The couple that lived in the house were very happy, and even thanked our team even though we hadn't worked on it.

When we got back to base, we were really encouraged and touched by what we had been through that day.  And with two days without physical work, we were ready to put in one last hard, long day before going back to Tokyo.

Ishinomaki Day 4

For my fourth day, we took a break from the relief work.  I was on a trip to Yamagata within my trip to Ishinomaki within my trip to Japan.  I felt like I was in the movie Inception.  It was really nice to relax and see northern Japan outside of the disaster zone.  Of course, the effects of the earthquake could still be seen.  Yamagata is usually a bustling city full of people, but when I was there it was practically empty.

 The main bit of sightseeing that we did was at the nearby Kaminoyama Castle.  Actually, the real castle was torn down a long time ago, and the one we visited was a reconstruction with a museum on the inside.  This isn't that surprising: there aren't that many true castles left in Japan (I hope to visit one of them when I go to the Kansai region later this month).  Still, I really liked it.  For some reason, I love the architecture of older Japanese buildings like castles, temples, and shrines.

 There was a bonsai festival going on that day

The tour was really fun!  We got to see a lot of historical artifacts from the area and learned some about how the castle fit into Japan's history.  By the end, we were well-rested and ready to head back to the Samaritan's Purse base.

Ishinomaki Day 3

Once again, people kept snoring, meaning that I was on my third day without a good night's sleep.  I was feeling really worn out, but I knew that I would be getting a break soon, so I tried to work as hard as I could.

That was my first day "mudding out" a house.  When the tsunami flooded houses, it brought lots and lots of mud with it.  This mud was mixed with lots of oil and probably lots of bacteria, too.  This concoction would go under the floorboards of houses and settle down, forming a layer of mud and compacted oil.  It stank and gave off a general feeling of "this stuff is bad."  Our job was to rip up the floorboards of a room and scoop all that junk out.  And the support beams underneath the floor made moving around really tedious.

I helped mud out two rooms from a woman's house.  She had called the city for help in cleaning, but hadn't heard back for months.  Luckily, she knew Mr. Abe, who was working with us.  To be honest, I don't remember much from that day other than it was hot, uncomfortable, hard, yet boring work and by the time I was done, I was really discouraged about just how far away people still are from recovering.  I was really relieved when my team came by early.

You see, Dr. Mehn knew that this kind of work would tire us out and that going for a week with no break wasn't feasible.  So he planned for us to have a bit of a break in the middle with some sightseeing.  We returned to the base early, cleaned ourselves up, and headed to a hotel.  Finally, I was able to get a good night's rest.

Ishinomaki Day 2

Like the first, my second night at the Samaritan's Purse base did not go well.  People who shall remain anonymous spent the night snoring very loudly.  At least they got a lot of rest.  With my lack of sleep and the soreness from the day before, I was not exactly in the best shape for working hard.  Thankfully, today was a bit lighter on work than the day before. 

That's because the relief volunteers would be holding a barbeque for the neighborhood of Shintate!  Pastor Dean had planned on only inviting a few families that they had helped, and were expecting about 70 people total, including us workers.  Somehow, though, word got out and over 90 people came!  Initially, we were afraid of running out of food, but thankfully some acquaintances of Dr. Mehn's brought some extra meat that we could cook.  Also, Nick (who I mentioned in my previous post) worked in the restaurant business for a while and knew how to spread the food out to make it last.  It ended up as a fish-and-loaves situation, because there was a fairly large amount left afterwords!

Before allowing the people to eat, Dean gave a speech about who we all were, that we were Christians, that we love the people of Shintate, and that God loves them also.  And that if any of them needed help, that we would gladly do so.  The response was enormous.  Dean and his team had spent many weeks trying to earn the trust of Shintate, and this seemed to be the payoff.  Before, people had been hesitant to accept help (this has a lot to do with the Japanese mindset), but, last I heard, there aren't enough workers to keep up with the requests!

After the barbeque, I helped clear out a few more bushes from Mr. Sugiyama's garden.  I also started a bit on clearing garbage and debris from a Mr. Andou's backyard.  If I understand it correctly, he was hesitant to let people clear it, and I think he was just frustrated and discouraged by how bad it was (and it was bad).  But after the BBQ, he allowed us in.  He said that all the volunteer's work had given him hope (the United Japan team that had cleared his neighbor's backyard had really done an amazing job.  I wish I had pictures).

When we were done with work, Dr. Mehn decided to take us to the city harbor to really see the damage done by the tsunami.  It still amazes me that it was able to flood houses in Shintate, at least a mile away from the ocean, but the areas closer to the sea were just devastated.  Here are a few pictures.  Keep in mind that this is three months after the disaster.

 A pile of metal debris that had been collected

 This is typically the kind of damage that houses got if they were not swept away.  The inside was definitely flooded.

 A residential area

 A typical Japanese cemetery with debris

 A lot of the smaller debris was already taken away, but the larger stuff is still lying around

There used to be a building here.  All that's left now is the foundation.

It's impossible to describe the scope of the effected area.  It is predicted to take three years just to clear all the debris.  Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if it took even longer.  It was at this point that the sheer enormity of the disaster hit me.

Ishinomaki Day 1

Each day at the Samaritan's Purse base started early to fit in as much work as possible.  I hadn't slept well because the night was colder than I expected.  By 8AM, we had left for the area of Shintate, Ishinomaki and got our first real look at the disaster area.  I didn't bring my camera with me because we were cautioned not to take pictures.  Past teams from other relief groups had spent a long time gaining the trust of this neighborhood.  Taking pictures might make the people living there feel like victims, and we definitely did not want to offend.  However, here is a Youtube video of the area by Mr. Abe (whose church I went to that Sunday) from sometime in April.  People have been working really hard to clean up and the main street in the video was completely clean by the time we arrived.  It's an unlisted video, so I can't embed it, but here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Mvl106xfxE

There were three groups working in the area with us: Pastor Dean, an acquaintance of Dr. Mehn, lead the overall operation; Samaritan's Purse; and Japan United, an organization made after the disaster by some Japanese churches.  Together, we went to work.

Although the roads had been cleared, there was still a lot of debris in people's yards.  For instance, the trailer from a semi somehow managed to get in between two houses without destroying them (and Japanese houses are close together!).  It's now stuck and will be really hard to get out.  It was strange seeing the destruction, but I had been bracing myself for a while.  It wouldn't be until after the trip that the emotional stress would get to me, actually.

Anyways, the first job I was given was to help clear the yard of an elderly gentleman named Mr. Sugiyama.  The leader of the Japan United team, Nick, explained that Mr. Sugiyama had allowed them to use his water supply, and they wanted to repay him.  He also talked about how Mr. Sugiyama had tried to save an elderly couple in the house across the road, but they ended up underestimating the power of the tsunami and were killed in their house.

Mr. Sugiyama's yard was mostly a large garden with a number of trees and bushes.  The tsunami had killed almost all of the bushes and a few of the trees, so I, along with my teammate Aaron and Nick, started pulling them up.  I have done landscaping once in my life, and that was probably the hardest physical work I had ever done up until I pulled out trees from Mr. Sugiyama's yard.  That first day was absolutely brutal.

Thankfully, Mr. Sugiyama would come out every once in a while and offer us coffee or soda.  My partner Aaron is a boisterous, amiable Hawaiian man, and would often try and engage Mr. Sugiyama in conversation, even if his Japanese needed more work.

Even though I didn't take pictures, Nick did.  There are even a few with me in them on his blog at http://unitedjapan.blogspot.com/.

The first day ended with me being tired, sore, and still a few more trees left to pull.  But I felt good to have put in a day's work, and Mr. Sugiyama seemed to appreciate what we did.  I was a bit worried, though.  The week had only just started and I was already exhausted!