First day: May 21st Tokyo To Ishimaki ①

Unfortunately, while in Ishinomaki-city, we encountered a difficulty to connect online.  We went to several places to get access including McDonald, but the online access in Japan is a bit complicated and not easy.....  I felt that Japanese wireless system in public area is not as convenient as in the US.

I am back in Tokyo now, so I want to continue this postings like my diary.

On May 21st, we left Tokyo 3 am and meeting other girls at Utsunomiya at 5 am.
Two cars are packed, really packed with relief supplies, such as water, clothing, bedding and towels.  I don't know how my friends packed the car like this... only breathing area for people left.

As soon as we arrived Ishinomaki Senshu University, Ishinomaki-city, we set up our tents.  Three of us are staying here for a week -two tents for three of us, more space is better.

This university offers their class rooms as a volunteer center and also their track field as a tent site for volunteers, and there are more 100 tents scattered around there when we got there, small and big, red, green, blue, etc.  It almost looks like the tent show !!

It looked like a regular outdoor activity, doesn't it?

We took a coffee break , then off to Ogatsu-city for relief supply delivery.

At this campus, one big supply warehouse is setup.  These supplies are for people who are living in their houses, but having difficulty getting foods, toiletry, and other things,  (They can not obtain enough supplies either due to the bad road conditions or financial difficulties because they lost jobs.)  and we, volunteers can get some items and deliver to them.  The supplies are coming from many companies and NPOs , such as UN WFP, Piece Boat, and several others.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kRMe1u42BbE (you can see how the warehouse is organized in first 5 minutes.)

We collected a lot of supplies by ourselves, but we wanted to take more water, beverages, and vegetables if they have. So we went to check out the warehouse.

Lucky !!!  We were able to get boxes of fresh cabbages, carrots, cucumbers and bell peppers. Every minutes their inventory changes as volunteers like us came in and out.  We got 10 more boxes water (2L x 6), bottled juice, cookies, rice crackers, food bars, and Konbu rolls (kelp rolls).

Now, we are ready to leave for Ogatsu-town.
Here is the google map for the town we went from Ishimaki-city.
Ishimaki-city, Miyagi to Ogatsu-town Map Link


Continue to the next posting.