What A Wonderful Night

Last night was such a wonderful night...

I teach English every Wednesday night in Hijiori. Yesterday, a young couple who evacuated from Sendai offered to hold a "Wine Tasting Class"

The wife is working for a Wine importing company, and her boss had just sent her some nice bottles of wine to cheer her up! So we got to taste some really expensive wines!! 

About 15 people participated, including the evacuees staying in my Ryokan from Fukushima.

Before starting the class, our "teacher" said some words in English. 

"We live in Sendai near the coast. Tsunami took my parents' house, and my husband's car. We were so scared and anxious. But We came to Hijiori, and we were so relieved that  people were extremely supportive and warm... "

She cried, and so did everybody else...

I love wine and I was always interested in learning wine tasting, but I never imagined that I would have the opportunity to do it in Hijiori!

She turned out to be a great instructor full of knowledge, and we learnt a lot about wine!

After half an hour, everybody became much more talkative, very Japanese of us :-) 

So we were all a bit tipsy, and happy. 

And all of a sudden, an incredible surprise!! One of the "young" wife from Fukushima appeared from an elevator, in the most peculiar costume of a man!!

She was wearing a mask of "Hyottoko", and her belly and butt were puffed with bamboo basket. 

The funniest part was, she was wearing "Tokkuri", or a pottery Sake bottle, between her legs (!!!), and kept dancing to music, tapping the Tokkuri with kind of a lacker plate. 

It was just HILARIOUS!!! I hadn't  laughed that much after the earthquake!

They invited all of us to dance with them. Even the kids were dancing with funny wigs and glasses!!

Just for your information, these two strange dancers are both beautiful women! 

Wow, women in Fukushima are unbelievable!! :-)

The thing is, this family also own a hotel. A very nice hotel right on the coast of Soma city, in Fukushima-ken. When they had elderly people's group as guests, they used to show this dance as an entertainment.

The young wife was telling me that she wanted to show us the dance. She said, "people here have been so good to us. Dancing would be one way to show you our gratitude!"  

A couple of days ago they went back to Soma city for one day to check out on their hotel, and they found the costume for the dance! Their 5-story hotel wasn't swept away by Tsunami but everything on the 1F was gone.... They came back that night, with 3 big bags of clothes that they found from the rubble.

In this very hard times, it felt so good to laugh. I think we all feel like it is inappropriate to laugh out loud. But feeling that "pure joy" gave me strength. 

Many people's lives have changed after the earthquake. But it is also true that tonight wouldn't have happened if it wasn't for the earthquake. 

Let us focus on the positive side... 

Last night was a magic! Minasan ARIGATO!! Thank you everyone!  

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Soup Kitchen

This morning, many people in Tohoku got tense when quite a big earthquake hit Miyagi coast area. I'm getting used to earthquakes, but this one scared me...

Today, 10 volunteers from my hometown, Hijiori Onsen went to serve food for the evacuees in Tendo city, which is about 2 hours away from Hijiori, where many people from Fukushima are staying. 


We went to Tendo Sport Center to serve soup for 150people staying there. On the way to Tendo, we saw many many many cars queuing in front of gas stands...


Today's menu is our specialty "Nameko-Jiru", or sticky mushroom soup. We took a big gas canister to cook outside.

Truth is, we were told about this the day before. We weren't sure where we were going to cook, or how. But everybody in Hijiori is quite experienced in holding events. All the Okami-san are experts in cooking "Nameko-Jiru" so my team was quite reliable! I didn't have to do much. I just helped them wash dishes and serve soup :-)


When I went inside to serve soup where people are sleeping, I felt quite uncomfortable. It was like peeking their private life. I didn't know how to act...


But many people liked our soup and they wanted more. 


Our first Soup Kitchen was a success. And we are having a second one in one week in Yamagata city. This time, we'll serve 800 people!! So that's gonna be a challenge! 


On the way back, we stopped by at Seven Eleven in Tendo city. We were all shocked to see inside. One third of the shelves were empty!! Somehow I had an illusion that there were supplies at convenience stores in Yamagata-ken, but I was very wrong. 


One lady wanted to buy 2 bottles of water, and the shop clerk told her that she is allowed to buy only one. 


Another guy wanted to buy some cigarette, and he was told that he couldn't buy more than 3 packs!


Today I realized how detached I was from the reality. 


We live in this small village where nice neighbors sell us small amount of gasoline, where local shops have some supply of food. 


Somehow I was thinking the situation in the city was  better. But it is worse. Much worse as a matter of fact. 



The best thing is to invite more evacuees to a place like Hijiori. We have hotels, we already have rooms and Futon, bath and food. But the negotiation between municipalities only allow them to provide shelter in public facilities like this sport center, where there is no privacy. 


To me it doesn't make sense to use money to prepare gym and community centers to accommodate for the evacuees when there are plenty of empty hotel rooms.... My village, Okura mura is going to shelter about 200 evacuees to same kind of facilities (some facilities don't even have shower! What are they gonna do? Take a bus everyday to Hijiori to take a bath??) 


But if people like us, Ryokan owners say that out loud, some would criticize us for being selfish and thinking about our own business. 


In fact, a couple of days ago, the government's Tourism Agency has announced that they will provide subsidy of 5,000yen per evacuee per day to stay in a Ryokan or Hotel. I'm not well informed how our village is going to react to it yet... But if they really think of the true necessity of the evacuees, the answer would be very simple...   

Clothes donation

Today was a really nice day for me... My friend and her 4 children came to visit us from Shinjo city. She managed to buy some gasoline! She brought A LOT of used clothes! 

She wanted to donate them to the evacuation centers, but they accept only brand-new clothes so she didn't know what to do with them. 

She heard that we had many children from the affected areas in my Ryokan, so she wanted to give her clothes to them. She even brought all of us some sweets! 

Look at this! She brought not only clothes but also scarf, caps, gloves for children which is hard to get in Hijiori. 

At first, I didn't know how people would react. I was afraid that some of them would get offended by it,,, for some reason. 

But on the contrary, all the mothers were super happy to receive her clothes! She had many clothes with cute designs so all the kids were also very excited to try them on. 

Just now, I was folding the clothes people didn't take so that I could give them to people staying in other Ryokan. One young mother from Fukushima helped me. 

She was very happy about all these clothes because she had lost everything with the Tsunami. 

She said "How could people be so kind!"

But the truth is, now in Japan, everybody is so eager to do something for the victims of the earthquake. So I was very relieved and happy that they liked the gift from my friend. 

My friend and her kids went home, content :-) Thank you So much Akiko san!

Tonight, we went to play sports at Hijiori community center. My sister and I invited all the kids and adults staying in my Ryokan, and about 15 of them joined us. The game was so much fun, and everybody was so excited! 

I think it was a good opportunity for them to get to know other people in my community, and also to have some fun!

Another group will leave tomorrow. We are becoming such good friends that I'd hate to see them leave. I'm gonna miss them so much! One of them told me "When things are better, I'll definitely come back to Hijiori!" I also promised her that I would definitely visit her in Soma city to have some crabs! But they told me "Maybe it'll be possible in 10 years time"...

Hopefully the nuclear power plant situation calms down quickly. 

Souvenior is MILK!

I took a bus to go to Shinjo today. It seems like things started moving a bit more in Shinjo. I saw a lot of trucks loading timbers, and tank rolly wagons carying kerosene or gasoline. 

But when I talked to Shinjo residents, they all told me that there is NO GAS at all at the gas stands. They only sell gas to the emergency vehicles, not to normal people. So their life is actually getting tougher since they are using up all their gasoline... It seems like gasoline situation is a bit better outside Shinojo city....

My colleague wanted to buy some batteries. My mother wanted me to buy some hot pads "Hokkairo" in Japanese. But they were sold out in all the majour shops. Look at this! No batteries, no light bulbs anywhere!!

Finally, we found some batteries and hot pads in Yamazaki Shop, which is a bit away from Shinjo City center! I was so excited to find my hot pads at last!





I brought back some milk and bread for my nephews. I had never bought milk as "souvenir" before.  But it's really hard to find milk right now. 


I feel so grateful for a cup of milk, a bowl of rice and miso soup. We might not have as much food as before, but what we have is enough.


Is life getting better?? Would things go back to normal??


Today, I was looking at some images of this earthquake on foreign media's website. And it was really shocking. Japanese media NEVER shows corpse. But foreign medias do. 


I saw a picture of a little body being rescued from a rubble. It just broke my heart. It really broke my heart, and all these pictures shocked me, and made me realize how real the whole thing is. 


On Japanese TV, it's easy to believe that things are getting better, people are overcoming this. Yes, they started making new houses, streets are being cleaned... 


But how could they overcome this tragedy!? 


My friend's brother lives in the coast of Miyagi, he survived the earthquake, but now he is working everyday, collecting bodies. Who is going to take care of these people!? How traumatizing!


I think many people around me feel sympathy for the victims but they are trying to avoid feeling empathy because it's just too much. We've got to feed ourselves and evacuees.  In Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima, Many many people have lost their loved ones. We've got to support them. We cannot afford to get depressed....   

New Life in Hijiori

There are many kids staying in my Ryokan. Some came from Fukushima, others from Miyagi... 


They started a new life in this snowy countryside. Many people were anxious about staying in such snowy place, but today people seemed much more comfortable. Maybe because it was Sunny :-)

We prepared many Mangas and DVDs in the lobby area so that kids can entertain themselves. 
6 cute "Jizo" dolls are made by one of our employees.


I've talked to many of the evacuees today. Some of them had horrifying stories. 


Some of them have lost their houses. Others, still have their house but everything on the 1F was washed away. One lady told me that even a grand piano was washed off.


The whole situation is new to everyone and people are quite confused. 


Locals don't know if they should treat the evacuees as new residents or guests. Since my hometown is isolated, there aren't many places people could go. I went for a walk with the evacuees today. It's nice for one day, but many people feel like they want to do something more.


Everybody wants to feel useful. So as a community, I think it's our duty to provide them that opportunity. One thing I can do is to invite people to my English class every Wednesday. Maybe some of them can be my co-teacher :-) I'll see what I can do! 


  

Hijiori's New Mission

Everyday, situation is changing. 
Hijiori was empty 4 days ago, and now it's PACKED!


Many people are arriving mostly from Miyagi and Fukushima everyday. 2 big groups have arrived today from Fukushima and Miyagi. One of them had his leg broken... :-( 


Yesterday it was snowing so much! Since Pacific coast area of Tohoku doesn't have much snow, many people were surprised and even anxious to see so much snow in Hijiori. They were saying, "Is this normal? Are we gonna be Ok here?". Today I overheard one of them talking on the phone, saying "Here, the snow walls are as high as 10m!" which is a bit of an exaggeration... :-)


Yesterday, one of the gas station in Okura mura sold gas, and this is what happened... 


Super long queue. It was more than 1km.


My father went to get gas despite our protest, and a couple of hours later came home in vain  :-(


The train is not running so Shinjo Sation was empty.

In Hijiori, we still have food at the shops. Not a lot, but I'd say enough so far. This is a picture of my nephew 3 seconds before being scolded for poking Tofu :-)


This Tofu is made in Hijiori, so we have plenty of Tofu, which is great!


My neighbors are also giving us food, knowing that we have many victims in our Ryokan. Solidarity in Hijiori

 Today at Kaneyama store, they were able to buy in Nisshin Cup Noodles for the first time after the earthquake!!


I had never felt so happy to see these precious cup noodles...


Kaneyama shop was also full of people evacuated from Miyagi and Fukushima. Many of them came to Hijiori without much stuff. Some were looking for underwear, which Hijiori shops don't have... 

Bread shelf is still empty. 


But it says that Bread and cake will arrive tomorrow !!


But the shop owner said only 40 % of what they have ordered will arrive. Good enough!! 

This is the picture of my nephew flying to the bus stop to welcome his aunt, my sister who came back to Hijiori today from Sendai. 


She is working for an American apparel company. Apparently, she and all her colleagues were ordered to evacuate from Sendai immediately... 


All American citizens are leaving Japan.


We are very confused, what to believe about nuclear power plant.


Some Japanese are also leaving Japan. So far, we don't have a plan to leave here.


I've been keeping myself busy everyday. 


I just hope that tomorrow will be a better day for many people who has been affected by the earthquake!! 

We can be a shelter

For a second, we thought life in our community would get back to normal... But it was just for a second.


Last night, Hijiori Onsen decided to receive 100 victims of earthquake for 1,000yen per night, with 3 meals. This was informed on TV, and our village office is having too many inquiries.

I was at the meeting. Some were skeptical about it, saying that we might not be able to receive victims when we don't even have enough fuels or food. 


But most were up for it. One guy said that our situation is far better than those who are sleeping on the cold floor of school gym, without much food, spending days without bath. 


We have plenty of empty rooms in the Ryokans, electricity (so far), and even great hot spring. We should do what we can do for the people who are in much worse situation. 


I totally agree with him!


The situation is changing minute by minute. 

As everyone knows, the nuclear power plant in Fukushima had a leak. Today, about 300 people moved into Yamagata to evacuate. Tomorrow, probably more. 


One family arrived at Hijiori last night from the city by the power plant. 9 people in a van, they brought everything they could take out of their house. They are staying at one of the Ryokans. 


In my Ryokan, last night arrived an old couple from Miyagi. Their house was far away from the coast, but they still don't have electricity or water. They expected that we had enough petrol in Yamagata, but they went to the gas station in Hijiori, only to find that they had stopped selling petrol the day before. Their stay might extend... 


Today, a family from the coast of Miyagi arrived. A  young couple with small children, and their grand parents. They said that the shop they own is destroyed. Their house was OK, but they live on the 11th floor of a building. And no electricity means no elevator! There is no water so they had to have many rounds of carrying water to 11th floor!!


We can be a shelter for them. 


But the electricity shortage is serious. Tomorrow, we'll have a scheduled blackout. 


Since Yamagata and Akita and part of Aomori were not affected as much. These areas will have blackout for 3 hours/day to save electricity in Tohoku.  


Solidarity!

Report from my sister in Sendai

My sister works in Sendai. She is ok, and she has been looking how she could help. She just wrote to me so I want to share it.



"Today (March 13) I went to my workplace but the building was closed and I couldn't go in. But I got to meet all my colleagues. They are all safe. I went home and took a nap since I couldn't sleep last night. 


After that, I went to a nearby elementary school where people are evacuated. I helped making Onigiri. I handed out the masks I had at home and asked each person if he/she needed anything. They all had horrible experiences, and wanted to share their stories with me. They kept talking as if talking itself was a console. Some people were weeping and they brought me tears...


I took some people's thermos bottles home to fill them with hot water. I cooked rice and made more Onigiri for them. 


I know being there (Yamagata) would be harder than being here because here I can actually help people. I can imagine how hard it must be to watch all this on TV and not being able to do anything. 


I can work for the people because I know all my family is safe. I'll do what I can do on your behalf."


   

Earthquake!

This is Rimiko. Internet is finally back. I checked my facebook and found many messages from my friends all over the world, worrying about me. They made me cry... 

In my hometown, Hijiori, (in Yamagata prefecture, west of Miyagi) the electricity came back last night. Until then, we depended all information on radio. We were hearing that many towns were completely destroyed but it was just surreal and couldn't imagine what was happening. 


Finally we can watch TV, and I've lost words. I was working in Sendai last year, and I was actually in Sendai the day before the earthquake. I have a lot of friends in Miyagi, and Fukushima, and I haven't been able to contact many of them....


At 14:45 on Friday, I was working on the event we were planning for Saturday, on the first floor of my Ryokan. All of a sudden my cellphone rang. It was an alarm for the earthquake. About 5 seconds later, it started shaking. I waited for it to end, but it didn't and it got even stronger. 


I rushed outside. It was snowing heavily. I could see the buildings shaking with loud noise. I saw electric wires moving like jumping ropes. 


But the buildings were OK and nobody was hurt in Hijiori. 


My sister lives in Sendai. At night, finally we got to contact her. She was OK. but her apartment was a chaos. She said all the dishes in her room were shuttered, TV and microwave fell and everything in her fridge fell out. She evacuated to a nearby elementary school. 


We spent a night in a candle light. It was cold but we had a heater that didn't use electricity, plus my Ryokan had Onsen poring out so we were OK.


My 6 year old nephew was very shocked. He couldn't stop crying. He brought out all his stuffed animals to cheer himself up. He fell asleep, crying... 


He keeps asking "Is earthquake coming again?" But the electricity is back so my nephews seem to feel much better. 


Being next to Miyagi, I feel like I should be there to help. But the reality is, I don't know what to do. 


My friends in Sendai are saying that the shops are empty, and there are long　queues in front of convenience stores so if I cannot secure my own food and shelter, I cannot go there. 


Also, gas is a big problem. The only gas station in my hometown is selling only 10 liter of gas per person. 


They are saying that we might have another huge earthquake within 3 days. This morning, we had quite a big one, and we keep feeling the ground shake...


I'm praying for all my friends in Miyagi and Fukushima. I don't know the whereabouts of many of my friends yet. Please be alive!!!!! 

Gassan Shizu Onsen!

I (rimiko) went to Gassan Shizu Onsen today. Gassan is the name of the mountain by my hometown, Hijiori Onsen. Gassan(月山) literally means "moon mountain". Romantic, huh?


It's called that way because it's shaped like moon... And it is a very sacred mountain. Many pilgrimages climb Gassan every year... 


Hijiori is at the northern foot of Gassan, and on the other side, is another famous TOJI Onsen town called "Gassan Shizu Onsen"


They had a Snow lantern festival. We also have the festival in Hijiori, but I must say that their's is a lot better. They work with 60 art students to convert the gigantic snow walls (6m tall!!!) into restaurants, an ice bar, and even a hotel (where my bosses stayed last year and almost died)


The whole street was lit with dim candle light and it was extremely romantic!


I got to steal a lot of good ideas for our snow festival next weekend. 




But soon it was too cold to stay outside... We stayed in a nice Ryokan called "Yukishiro" http://www6.ocn.ne.jp/~yukisiro/


They served such gorgeous mountain dishes!

They were so yummy and I felt like my body was being cleansed by eating all the mountain vegetables picked in a sacred mountain.


We drank a lot of Gassan Beer and Gassan Wine as well (they are also for cleansing our soul :-b  ) 


Tanoshikatta! (I had fun!)

Volunteer Needed for Snow Festival

We have just finished a thrilling Snow Digging World Cup in Hijiori Onsen, but we have more events liked up in March

March 14 (mon)- 21(mon)
New Sake Matsuri
Every year, in March, Sake breweries in Okura mura produce Sake of that year, cold climate makes Sake taste so good!!
During the time, all the liquor shops in Okura mura, offer FREE SAKE TASTING!!


March 19 (sat)
Okura Snow Festival
 18:00 -
Okura mura is famous for the heavy snow fall! In 1995, the village made a HUGE snow man (30m tall!) who was recorded in Guiness World Record! However, in 2008, community of Bethel, Maine, USA made even bigger snow "woman" who beat our Okura-kun :-(


We still make a huge snow man every year and have a snow festival around him. 


This year, we'll have fireworks, Huge snow house, Free Ama-Zake (Sweet Sake) and Tama Konnyaku (round soy sauce taste snack made of potatos)


Every house of Okura mura will make its original snow lantern and light it in front of the house. 


We are looking for VOLUNTEERS who can help us make snow lanterns, and also to decorate the snow walls with candles. 


If you are interested, please e-mail rimiko@gmail.com  I could organize cheap accommodation as well :-)


Snow Festival + Fireworks + Free Sake + Lantern Festival + Wonderful ONSEN wouldn't hurt ;-)

Snow Digging World Cup MOVIE

Now you can watch Snow Digging World Cup in Hijiori 2011 movie on youtube!


Check it out! It's hilarious but you'd be moved to tears :-)

SNOW DIGGIN' WORLD CUP!

Snow Digging World Cup was held in Hijiori Onsen on Feb 27 (Sun). It was sooooo much FUN!!


We organized a tour, and from our tour, two teams have participated. "Team Yamagata Caravan" and "Team International" We wanted to recruit foreign participants to make it a real "World Cup", we had some inquiries but at the end, KC from NEPAL decided to participated! Dannyabad KC!


There were 14 teams. Some came from Hokkaido and Sendai!



The height of the snow was about 2.7m. On the snow filed, there are 14 red circles for 14 teams. We had a sleigh competition first,  and the winner got to choose the spot. 


Snow Digging Rule is very simple. Just dig the snow with shovels and what we call here "snow dump", until you hit the earth. If you reach the earth, take the piece of earth to the goal!  


It might sound like a simple game but it was extremely hard and extremely exciting!!


We started digging digging, and the after a few minutes, the local young people's team already started running towards the goal! "What!?" "Already!?" At that point, our snow hole was only 1m deep. 


One after another, we could hear the scream of joy and we started feeling pressure. We don't wanna be the last one!!

Finally, our shovel hit the earth!!! We all ran together to the goal!!!! Yeah!!!! Wow, I had never felt like that since my Jr.high school sport event. 


It turned out that it took us 29minutes to finish. It took the last team 45 minutes to reach the earth! The first team,,, only 6 minutes. They are amazing!!


Next year, we hope to have even more participants from all over the world!!ちょうおもしろいよ！