The J3's (Lisa, Larry, Luke and I) were given permission from the Japan Evangelical Lutheran Church to volunteer in Ishinomaki one of the many tsunami hit areas in Northern Japan. Working along side the JELR we traveled from Tokyo to Sendai (about an hour long bullet train ride)and stayed the night in a church that was being used by the JELR. The church had piles of food, clothing and other supplies that were for distribution to the local people. As with all of the people here in Japan all the people with the JELR went out of their way to make us feel comfortable.
After a good nights rest inside the church in Sendai the four of us along with Paul and our driver headed off from Sendai to Ishinomaki to volunteer. When we were given our assignment we took a short drive to a house that had been affected by the tsunami. The house was located just over a mile from the coast line, however the tsunami still pushed into the house strong enough to punch a hole through one of the walls. You could still see the water line mark on the walls of the house from where the height of the water stood, about a foot off the ground. The majority of the damage to this house though was caused by the water staying in the house for a prolonged period of time. I was told it took about three weeks for the majority of the water to leave the area.
The water damaged allot of house hold items along with depositing a thick layer of sediment under the floor boards of the home and it needed to be cleaned out. Our job as volunteers for the day was to clean out all of the water soaked house objects such as blankets, beds, furniture etc that had been taken out of the house after the water reseeded. We along with moved a fridge that no longer worked from inside the house. What made this a hard task was the fact that the Japanese always take off their shoes and the space inside of the house was very tight.
After all of the items were moved to the road for pickup by the towns’ garbage crew the couple wanted to show their thanks by serving us tea and snacks. During this time they spoke about how they never thought the tsunami was going to ever reach this far inland to their home. They also said that the tsunami hit their home from two sides, one fast and hard punching a hole into the side of the house while the other trickled in slowly from their back yard. The older gentlemen jokingly said “The worst thing about the tsunami was that I put new tires on my car a few days before it hit. Then my car was washed away. Wish I would have put off working on those tires and relaxed instead.” It was good to hear that he still had a sense of humor. If I remember correctly the couple was over 75 years old and because of this they had decided together that they would not buy another car.
**A special thanks to Paul for translating Japanese into English, and our driver for his kindness and willingness to show us around the area**
