Ishinomaki Photos ② daily thing..

Photo Taken May 21 - 27

"Summer camp - Ishinomaki trip" ??

Famous !! Sendai tongue BBQ - yummy...

Canned "Survival Choco-chip bread" - pretty good

"Clown Volunteer"

Firemen - Yakiniku (Meat and Veggie) as breakfast !!

Ishinomaki Photos ①

Photos taken May 21st and 22nd - Ogatsu and Minami-Sanriku area

The Self-Defense Forces Water Tank delivering water to each houses

May 27: Last job and heading home..

We are heading home today.

It is nice day again.  We have been very lucky with weather.  No rain, no wind.  Nice weather all through the week we stayed.

We have one more job to do before heading home.  We promised with ladies in Ogatsu that we would bring foods again.  Special request from them - Bananas, Milk, Tofu, Sausages, Ham.

It took for a while for us to get our car ready.  We needed to take down two tents and to load our stuff back to the car.  Why do we still have so many stuff???   oh....the garbage... yes, our garbage.
Volunteers are to take their garbage home.  Do not leave your litter behind.  It is just like going to camping in woods.  Unfortunately and sadly..... we saw some people leave things behind....

one tent down

almost clean..

We need to keep one seat here... can we?  the green bag is our garbage.

with relief supplies loaded, the car is very very full - again...

Fortunately, we were able to find fresh vegetables and fruits in the supply warehouse again.
We got a box of banana, 20 pieces of oranges, and bunches of Japanese spinach.  We also grabbed bags of seasoned soy beans, roasted chestnuts - mainly protein source which they are lacking for last two months.    We went a local supermarket and bought milk, tofu, sausages and ham.  Again, thank you so much for your cash donation, everyone !!

by the time we were done with shopping, it was already noon.  So we stopped at the river bed on our way to Ogatsu and prepared our last camping style lunch - CURRY RICE !!

You know, I really think that two things / inventions changed the camping industry. 
  First one - that portable gas stove (burner).  
  Second one - Retort Pouch Processing. 
They are so convenient.  With this gas stove the camping is now too easy, and you feel like you are cooking at home.  And the retort pouch food is so tasty and fast to prepare (just heating in the boiling water.)  You turn on the gas just by twisting the knob, then you can cook anything.  It was very windy outside, so we needed to bring the stove in the car.  Here is the process of our lunch making.

first try - too windy

correction made for wind - first step:  cooking rice

second step - heating the retort pouch Curry gravy in the kettle

Japanese Favorate  -  Curry Rice !!

Stuffed with Curry, we were driving another hour to get to Ogatsu.
When we got to the community hall, the ladies were cleaning up after lunch.
"We brought bananas and tofu for you !!"

As they smiled to see these foods, they told us that the road with landslides were open again and they could go to town easily now.  It is a great news !  They could go shopping as normal gain !

However, they did not sound completely happy - because as we talked more, we realized most of them has no income sources anymore.  They had no income for last two months.  Their main industry in this whole community was fishery.  They used to get Scallops, Oysters, Kelp, but they lost all nets and devices which they invested in hundreds of thousands of dollars.   Their warehouses are destroyed completely - I saw this town - completely gone by Tsunami...  Men were engaging fishery, and women went to work warehouses, stores and small offices in other town, which is also gone.

One lady said to me that they could go to stores now because the road is fixed, but still they can not buy anything because we don't have income....

How long do they need to worry about their future?  How long would it take for them to get some sort of help so that they can get their own feet again?
What is the plan?  any plan?  best plan?   What can we do to help them ??

May 26: Last day for Physical Labor

We are going back home tomorrow, so this is the last day for our physical labor.

My body is getting used to this daily rhythm, get up early, work hard, and go to bed early.  Oh, wow !! I am feeling great !  I feel like I could continue staying here another week or maybe a month !!  I am not  feeling tired, and I am really enjoying being here and working.

Well... it is only three days I have worked so far, and I know it is too early to say I could continue longer or not.  However, I know now i will be coming back again.  I was not really thinking about coming back when I came here a week ago; it was a possibility at that time, but now it is definitely a plan for me.  I have noticed as I worked together that many of volunteers are repeaters.  I think many feel that the clean -up needs to be done as quickly as possible, and that they know how good they feel physically and mentally working here.  In a way, this could be addictive.

Another day starts - today's assignment is to remove mud and sludge from the front yard of a house.

The area is close to the ocean and a huge paper manufacturer, so most of houses are destroyed completely and the papers are everywhere, the road, on the house and bushes, in the mud...everywhere.  We needed to dig out the almost dried mud and sludge from the yard and the street gutter.  There are 8 men and 2 women in this team.  Men focused on shoveling out sludge from the gutter, and we, girls, focused on digging out the papers, mud, broken ceramics from the yard.

At the lunch break, one guys made a comment that he felt that all of volunteers working here Ishinomaki were either licensed constructors or semi-professionals in the construction industry because people seem to know what they were doing.  He had volunteer work in the different city, but the work was not as physical as it were here.

He might be right, I thought....   I met several people who have construction business or they used to.  Or as I said before, many volunteers are repeaters, so they have enough "dirty work" experience and they look like a semi-professional in construction business.



I met many people here.  And I am happily surprised there are so many different type of people gathering here.  I want to tell you about people I met.  Some people are friendly, the other are kinda quiet.  They are all fun and admirable people.

Firemen from different cities all over Japan

College student who took a leave of absent for one or two semesters

Yakitori (chicken on a stick) Bar owner and a professional constructor from Hyogo who had  experienced flood two years ago in their hometown and felt saved by volunteers at that time　－ they want to return a favor.

A retired man in 60's who came by bicycle (!!) from Yokohama to Ishinomaki (260 miles) taking 10 days

Translator who stayed in a tent for 5 days and moved to a hotel in Sendai for other 2 days so that she can continue working.  (She is a repeater, and when I met her she was in her three weeks stay in Ishinomaki.)

A retired grandpa who stays and works in Ishinomaki in weekdays, and goes back home in Akita 2 days in weekend.

A man in 50s who goes to a school to start new career in social services - he makes one-day trip when his school is off.

He called himself  "clown volunteer" - I heard he dresses up like a clown and goes to schools everyday to make children happy.

It is so fun to meet these people - everybody has a story and a reason to be here.
When you talk to them, you feel like you know them for a long time.  They are just like your old friend - you just met them one day, but you do feel very close to them all.

I will miss them as we leave here tomorrow, but I am sure I will meet them again here in Ishinomaki when I come back.

May 25th: Getting the Hang of Mud Removing

I was up and moving around about 6 am again, refreshed feeling really good.

I think our body is designed to work well with the schedule like this.  Wake up in early morning when the sun is up.  Then go to work, the physical hard work.  Come back home and eat dinner around 6 pm.  Sleep by 8 or 9 pm.  My friends agree with this theory.  Even doing hard physical work for last two days, we feel great every morning !!  So, if you want to feel great every morning, your day is 6 am to 9 pm, got it, everyone?

After the hard physical work, I slept really well last night.  My back is fine, no pain at all.  I thought.... maybe I did build up my muscle with my exercise with "Brazil Butt Lift" ?!!   Well.... I do know why my back does not hurt and not stiff at all - I took a workout supplements called 「SPORT」, doubled, for faster recovery.  Hehehe.  It does a magic like this occasion. 

Today the house we went was closer to the port.  So the damage to the neighborhood was bad.  The owner and the family are living in the upstairs of the house, and the first floor - same as everywhere, flooded and mud under the floor.  They have not removed the floor, so we were to clean up their yard filled with rabble and yucky smelly mud.  The previous team worked on the yard yesterday, so it looked much better compared to their neighbors.

next door to the house we worked on this day

I don't know how they feel living in this neighborhood.  Watching this view and live there everyday is not normal.  Not normal at all.  We really need to clean up the mess so that people could feel normal again.  The house owner said to us that when they were cleaning by themselves, they could not see the progress. However, when the volunteers came with a group of 5 - 10 people, they saw the big result and could hope it would be better some day again.

I felt the same way, too.  The fist day when we saw the heavy damages to the oceanfront towns, we did not think there would be a future to these towns.  I could not see what they are going to do to rebuild the town.  But now after working three days in the different houses, I saw the progress, definite progress - the yard looked much better and cleaned.

Day by day, house by house, and the town by town, I am sure that is how the rebuilding of cities will progress.  To have a successful rebuilding, we still need more volunteers, a lot of them.  More volunteers mean faster recovery.

I really hope more people can join the clean-up volunteers in cities like Ishinomaki.. Please think about visit there at least in order to see these cities by your own eyes and feel what you see.  And if you can make one day to volunteer, that helps one family and gives hope for their future.

Of course, there are many other ways to help these people and cities, too.  You can donate cash to NPOs, send relief supplies, or buy merchandise from the businesses in these areas.

Question is....... .what can I do to contribute?   what can you do to help ?

May 24th: Where are those young men I had yesterday???!

Well, I feel perky today.  Yesterday, I did just a light work and rested well.

You get to be awake around 5:30 am every morning while living in a tent since the bright sun light lets you know it is the morning - time to be up and to get ready for our breakfast after 6:00 am.

Here is our daily morning drill.
Step ①  Heat water for coffee:  I personally can not live without a cup of coffee in the morning.
Step ②　Measure appropriate amount (very important !!) of water and soak rice before cooking.  We used "wash-free rice" - it is very easy and no waste of water at the tent site.
Step ③　After 20 min of soaking, start cooking rice.
Step ④　Make some "rice balls"for lunch.

cooking rice

Breakfast - Rice and soup

Rice balls with Nori - for Lunch

Well, once rice balls are made, we are ready to go to work.

Today, again, we decided to work in a separate team.  As we gathered at the registration desk, I heard that we might work as a smaller group because there were less volunteers available today.  Availability of volunteers varies day to day, today was 564 people worked according to the Ishinomaki Volunteer Center website.  Until mid May, there were about 1,000 volunteers working each day.   As many residents are concerned, the number of volunteers are clearly declining.  It is not a good sign....

This is my second day of mud removing operation.....

Oh my,,,,  I thought we never finish that house in one day.  As I said, I had 9 guys with me yesterday, and I missed them so much for today's work.  The job sheet says to remove mud under the floor with 5 people.  Well, we only have 4 people due to the shortage of volunteers -  two men in 60's, and two girls.   Then the house was twice big as yesterday's.  And.....there are big gravels, another layer over the dirt.....

This house was installed with an interesting heating system, which keeps heat under the floor (with layers of dirt and gravels on top of a sheet of plastic) and distributes heat along the side walls with special groove.  That means that air circulate all over the house with heat.... We have to remove the mud and all dried gunk under the floor completely, it is going to be not pleasant being the house, very smelly..

So, our job today is pretty much removing the gravels to outside.  How many sand bags we made??   I don't know...  Maybe 150 bags for four of us..  Floor was removed already, but floor frame is still there and we can not squat down completely, which would be easier for my back..  First 15 min, we were chatting and working.  Then we all became quiet... focusing on gravels;  we just scoop the gravels and put into sand bags.
We took a 10 min. break every hour and an hour break for lunch, thank god !  My back felt like stuck bending after about a half hour of shoveling.  I thought I might break my back as I tried to straighten it up at the break time.  Where the heck of those 9 young men who worked yesterday ???  They should be working at the site like this !!

shoveling out gravels

oh yes.....we worked hard ... we really did work hard with four of us.
About 2:30 pm, we asked the owner to check our work, any other things to do, then we were done by 3:00pm.  I was happily surprised that we were able to finish this site in one day.  We really did a good job.  My back was telling me that I did work hard..  Well, I was so looking forward to going to the bath house after the job.

Well, the treat for our hard work was waiting for us at the tent site.

Kyushu Ramen "soup-kitchen" for volunteers ! Yeah !!

 There was a Ramen stand, very tasty Kyushu Ramen, for volunteers !!  Sometimes a group of people, a store or some people set up a counter and offer free meals to volunteers, like a soup-kitchen. We got lucky today - it was a very tasty Ramen.
You know.... your hard work is always rewarded.  You never know how and when, but I always feel this is true.  A feel of tiredness, satisfaction from hard physical work, and full tummy.... that was a good feeling.  Addictively, good feeling....

Arty picture of Ramen   taken by Kiki

My friend came later, and she ate her Ramen in our tent.  As I watched her eat, I reached to the energy drink my friend parent sent with us - "Tiobita"   Every Japanese knows this drink (like a Red Bull here) - popular TV commercial for last 40 years or so in Japan.  My parents has their stocks at home, too. 

After we took this little break, and off to the bath house.  I hope I can wake up and stand up tomorrow morning...

Public Bath set up by Self-Defense Forces (Jiei-tai Buro)

Taking a hot bath is very important to Japanese. 
Not only to take the shower, we soak in tub with hot water (about 105°F - 109 °F).  At the end of the day, soaking in the hot tub rejuvenate the body and get ready for the next day.

At Ishinomaki-city, we were lucky to have an access to the Jiei-tai Buro, which is a public bath house set up by The Self-Defense Forces for local people since many can not have a bath still waiting for a new water heater, or they are still living at the evacuation centers.  Thanks to the Self-Defense Forces, we, volunteers, are also allowed to utilize the bath, too, along with local people. 

If you know about Japanese public bath house, the Jiei-tai Buro is just like that.   If you don't know about it, imagine the pool filled with hot water (shower temperature) and all naked people are soaking in the tub or washing the body around the pool.

example of real Japanese public bath, Sento

Of course, this public bath set up by the Self-Defense Forces is not fancy like the above picture..
Using metal pipes and blue tarp, they made a square tub, very sturdy one, and filled with hot water with perfect temperature !!  I wish I could take a picture of that tub....  It was amazingly well built.  They really know how to build a nice hot tub...

Each building, for men and women, they set up two tubs, and a changing room in front.  Also they had a waiting room in case they need to control the number of people in the tub area.  Around the tub, about 16 people can sit and wash their bodies.  Shampoos, conditioners, and body wash are available inside too.  You can click the pictures to expand.

Sign for business (?) hours - till 8:30 pm

Building for men, left, and relief supply room, right

building for women

These buildings are set up along the river, and they pump up the water from the river.  Then they filtered water two or three times before heat.  Hot water is constantly added to the tub to maintain the perfect temperature and the clean water.

It has been recognized that the contribution of the Self-Defense Forces in this disaster is huge. From the beginning, they are the one to go rescuing people and delivering the relief supplies to places that regular people can not reach.  Even now, we see their trucks and heavy machinery to clean up the city.  For setting up a bath house like this in the multiple places, I really think only the Self-Defense Forces knows how to organize things with this scale.  It is simply amazing, and I am very appreciative for the Self-Defense Forces.

Thank you for your help, Jiei-tai !!!