JCG Blog

March 25: Picked up letter from Nelson’s Mayor Dooley addressed to the mayor of Onagawa cho citing support from all areas of the Nelson community. This will be delivered by hand by John. Japanese broadcast on radio from the nearby town of Ishinomaki reports on Nelson support efforts-to be conveyed to its neighbouring community in Onagawa Cho. Friend of John in Tokyo reports that many drivers now fear to deliver supplies to stricken areas near Fukushima. She wants to deliver herself, but has no license. John suggested he drive, she carry. She will hopefully get permission-thus widening the support alternatives for John (still no reply from requests to volunteer as interpreter.)

March 26: Thanks to Namiko Jury who spoke on camera for the people of Onagawa and who has also been very helpful in connecting John with Ishininomaki radio station and NHK in Sendai.

Kei is still busy getting support for the book of hope and Alisa has done a great job decorating its inner page.

Book of Hope: Inside cover

March 27: A new website up in Japanese by support friends over there. Preparing for departure with a video message from Wendy Lacroix. Then to Trail and Vancouver. Some new videos of the Book of Hope are up on the Japanese Facebook site

Onagawa-cho damage from tsunami

John has just received more letters from homestay parents to the young people in Onagawa who came to Nelson. These will be delivered in about two weeks if all goes according to plan. He is now heading for Trail airport. Wendy’s message has also just been edited. Here it is:

March 29: John arrived safely in Yanagawa via Narita international airport in Tokyo, Fukuoka airport in Kyushu and a one hour car journey. He is hosted by the Matsufuji family who have arranged a talk for him on April 1st. Mr. Matsufuji is a very respected member of this 70,000 strong town and has been a key person in connecting John to the mayor and the fire hall where the following interview took place. From here John will commence his journey to Onagawa. Yanagawa is ‘willow tree river’ in English, and Onagawa is ‘ woman’s river’. These two ‘river’ towns will thus be connected and hopefully create an ongoing link to support each other’s communities.

John next was introduced to the chief of the Yanagawa fire hall Mr. Teruaki Koga. He explained how his firehall had been only one of the Kyushu fire departments to send a total of 50 fire trucks and ambulances to the disaster struck area. Three of his men were dispatched.

Following is the interview conducted with Yanagawa fire department’s Daichi Imazaki. The reason it took four days to arrive was in part due to the fact that 50 firetrucks and ambulances were moving together over 1400 kilometers as a group. Pit stops for gas thus took quite some time as well as safety checks for radiation nearer the tsunami stricken area where the nuclear reactors were damaged. The main points of this 9 minute interview were interpreted by a jet lagged John!

On the way back from the interviews the cherry blossoms were in bloom near one of Yanagawa’s many picturesque canals.

March 30: Making preparation for fundraising talk tomorrow. A slip　of the tongue makes Onagawa Yonagawa which seems like a blend of Yanagawa and Onagawa! Today there is a movement to pool resources and purchase a motorcycle so John can start the trip on two wheels from here. A generous donor has already begun this -all must be decided quickly as he leaves in three days for Osaka. The idea is to donate the motorcycle to Onagawa for use on its severely damaged roads where cars cannot yet pass. We shall soon know if this is to be the case.

Nelson Flag at YogaShalaAun

March 31st:

The motorcycle has been secured and will be delivered tomorrow. It is a 250 cc Kawasaki Estrella (Spanish for star?) John talked with a Kyoto friend Jeff Taylor this morning who is with relief workers up in Iwate prefecture. Here is part of his email:

The organization i’m working with is called second harvest (set up by an American who’s been delivering food to the homeless in Ueno and Sanya for the last 12 years). Here’s their site:

” I saw you were going to be here and wanted to try and meet up with you to give you a ‘heads up’ on the various relief groups i’ve met so far and what they are doing. It really is utterly apocalyptic and after what I’ve seen in the last few days, just wonder ‘where to begin’? We drive back to Tokyo tomorrow night and i’ll be there for a few days. Hope to see you there.”

Preparations for the charity talk here tonight are in full swing. John is now preparing to go meet the mayor of Yanagawa and show him the Nelson flag as well as present him with Nelson badges.

Yanagawa Mayor Kaneko

April 1: Almost two hours of his valuable time were spared by Mayor Kaneko and his top advisors. The Arise Japan project was fully supported by the decision to send $6000 recently donated by a fisherman (Mr. Tanaka) who held an event using Japanese drums to inspire the survivors of the disaster.

John will take the DVD of that event to Onagawa as well as a promise to deliver the money to their account. Thirty housing units will be mad available for temporary relocation of Onagawa folks down in Yanagawa. All in all the city of Yanagawa has collected about 300,000 dollars for disaster relief.

Nelson city badges were given to the mayor and staff and the Forge Ahead slogan was discussed as being perfect for the current situation in Japan. After the meeting about a hundred local folks showed up for John’s charity talk-all proceeds going to Onagawa also.

So in one day about $7000 was earmarked for Onagawa. The mayor gave John his official card to present to Onagawa’s mayor and is preparing a message for the book of hope today.

April 2: Participants in the one day long seminar at the Yoga Shala Aun centre enthusiastically supported the upcoming departure on this motorcycle. Many of them helped affix Arise Japan stickers on the tank, front and back of the bike. Meanwhile the mayor gave John a letter of promise of payment of funds to be delivered to the mayor of Onagawa.

Arise Japan motorcycle support!

April 7: John sped from Yanagawa to Osaka in 8 hours-a distance of about 750 kilometers. Luckily the weather was clear but bracing. Two jackets were a great help. A night in Osaka was followed by a shorter trip to the extraordinary madama mura.Madamamura

It was built by a friend of John’s twenty years ago and is an authentic reproduction of a Jomon period dwelling. The owner is a great believer in the harmony based culture the ancient Japanese had. Proceeds from the small gathering attending John’s evening charity talk will go to Onagawa along with an actual piggy bank full of cash donated by a young lady in Yanagawa!

John leaving madamamura. Check for legs!

John is now in Kanazawa with the stunning Mount Haku clearly visible in the distance. Today a talk is scheduled for the evening. He will join the sponsor of his talk on a trip to the local shrine to pray for the success of this mission. John is now in contact with a good friend who has been in the disaster area. This is on of the photos he took in Iwate. Jeff described the area as apocalyptic.

Iwate tsunami damage. by Jeff Taylor

The satellite tracker seems to be working though only sporadically. An oil leak was found to be due to high revs for too long on an engine only just running in (it was purchased with 2700 km on the clock) but it is not serious. Kanazawa has seen a sixty percent drop in foreign tourists to its famous sights. There is still a lot of news about nuclear fallout but John has been studying the data and he feels it is not at all as serious as the media would oft have us believe. He intends to do volunteer food supply driving with Jeff’s introduction.

April 13:

Radio Logo

He is thankful to the Second Harvest group for filling his truck with supplies yesterday in Tokyo. There have been several earthquakes in the last few days including one while he was driving today. His cellphone alerted him to the earthquake and so he was able to pull into a parking area.

Upon arriving in Sendai near the sea he was deeply moved by the devastation he saw. Internet may not be available in Onagawa cho so depending on that the next report will be delayed. John intends to use his truck as much as possible to further deliver needed supplies.
April 13*

Onagawa Nelson

I have just returned from a twilight walk. Until you see it there actually is no connection. Few people out. Cars. Self defence forces in jeeps and the all consuming silence amidst the debris. Twisted beyond belief there are cars and boats in places they should never be. Up trees there
still hang furniture parts, bits of carpet and clothes that used to protect people who are no longer with us. 15-20 % of the citizens of this once tranquil fishing village are literally gone. Only three hundred are accounted for in a town of 10,000.

Walking up a bent cement staircase as the sun set the full impact came into me from above. Totally gone-a whole town. A bizarre sight half way up the steps: 10 fish huddled in a bunch that have somehow not rotted since the sea lifted them up these stairs.

A car that was so frontally assaulted that it seems to have wings up on its perch above the road surface-lifted by a force almost beyond the mind’s ability to grasp.

The soldiers unloaded my four ton truck full of spaghetti, tomato sauce, bicycles, a motorcycle and clothes along with chemical toilet units and towels, paper cups and plates. There are enough supplies for now it seems. But sympathy runs out and the nuclear problem has got everybody in a scare.

Driving here my cell phone made an eerie sound. It was an earthquake warning-so well organized! I eased the ruck into a parking area off the highway. Aftershocks are now as regular as rain in Nelson.

Leaving Sendai on the way here I was wondering if all the reports had been exaggerated. But turning one corner was enough to dispel that idea. I was shaking, gripping the wheel trying to control the sobbing. It was as if all the landscape was still shrieking from the battering it had taken despite the ever present cars, totally undamaged building sand life as always. It was a study in contradiction such as I have never seen.

Mr. Doi said his biggest heartache was in not being able to thank all those who have given so much. He told me how he had rushed up to the top of a building and watched his town disappear. The wave did not just come once. It surged back up and down the entire narrow corridor the town had been fatally built in again and again he said. Like a merciless tyrant the wave would not recede until its work was done. That was the annihilation of Onagawa cho.

I hear laughter in the corridors of this temporary headquarters for coordinating the recovery. I talked to Mr. Chiba who well remembers Bruce Lacroix and his wife Wendy in Nelson. he shared his happy memories with me-smiling each time he brought to mind a restaurant he had been.

These people are resilient beyond all. Let us all pray that this community is spared any more assaults from the now placid ocean I have just walked in front of.

Let us all pray that we never have to see what these people have seen.

Taking photos was out of the question. I was in a graveyard after all..

April 14*

Onagawa cho middle school was quite cheerful this morning as I gave a short talk to the students who had been in Nelson. The letters given by homestay parents in Nelson were for students now in high school so Mr. Doi will follow up and get those letters out to them. I gave them all badges from Nelson (some had lost the ones they got in Nelson in the tsunami) and the prayer flags made of messages written on cloth. Some had lost their parents. As I left Onagawa I shot the above film from the motorcycle. Having come in from the untouched area of Ishinomaki yesterday I was totally unprepared for the far wider area of damage to the port area of Ishinomaki. I shot a lot of Iphone film from my motorcycle which will be uploaded later but being a far larger town the impact was even more powerful.

I rode for a full half hour up and down streets that looked like they were sets from disaster movies. The smell was quite intense. Now I am back in radio FM Ishinomaki to update these blogs. I will start giving people massages in my truck today and do storytelling at night. The actor Ken Watanabe is coming to Ishinomaki today as part of the Kizuna project (kizuna means bond of empathy). I will be returning to Onagawa soon.

Tsunami car

It was a tough day-relentless scenes like this the locals are totally used to by now-this is a vast improvement!

Power of trees

April 15: Yesterday a dentist gave me free treatment as he knew what I am here for. He bowedand said, ” So sorry you had to come all this way to help us. Please do not pay anything! I had no health insurance-he could easily have charged hundreds! We have forgotten the way of chivalry in the West I fear. Then today as I uploaded videos at the cell phone shop the manager gave me a brand new Iphone charger as he could see how much juice I was using taking videos. No money he said! Amazing folks. I went to the Onagawa nuclear plant today and did an interview in Japanese. More on my Japanese FAcebook page.

April 16:A very windy day here and much colder. It was a regroup day for me updating reports and also writing for the book I am now working on. I met Michael who had driven up from Tokyo with a van full of bananas and French cookies. He had tried to unload them at one place in Onagawa with his Japanese brother in law but they had said they did not need them.

He asked me if I knew of a place to download and I then inquired at the depot where my truck’s load had been landed. They accepted the offer and six or so boxes of bananas and thirty or so small boxes of cookies were received. Micheal has been up here several times and was the man who recommended I hire my own truck. After brief conversation he left. There is little time for pleasantry in this environment I felt. Everybody is doing a job.

I watched a highly interesting lecture by a Tokyo university doctor on youtube last night-a specialist in cancer and aids as well as radioactivity. He emphasized in his totally amazing lecture that there is NO problem with the current levels of radiation from Fukushima. He actually said that the dosage had been misinterpreted causing far too much fear.

He was a welcome voice to this controversy. I have never personally been concerned about the radiation. Why then are people being evacuated? My sense is that the government wants to cover all bases and not be faced with lengthy court battles it can ill afford.

I am in communication with Charles from the supply organization second harvest. He may have a job for me in another area. Meanwhile I am preparing to finish the book of hope (sticking loose papers in with glue) and counting the money to be given.

I contacted Wendy from the City of nelson and recommended trips to Nelson for Onagawa residents in need of psychological space. As I walked round the evacuation camp in the gymnasium here there was a dark sense of waiting for something still very unclear..a future plan. People were boxed in (about 800) in cardboard sectioned areas big enough for two people. Then I walked round the tent camp just below there where 100 tents were pitched by the self defence forces.

There is still a supply and demand communication problem like Michael had today. He drove all the way from Tokyo (9 hours) only to be refused at the first port of call. I have just talked to another driver in Minami Sanriku who may have some runs for me next week. All is in flux. Two more tremblors last night shook up the truck a bit but I slept fairly well. Right now it is very cold all of a sudden down from 20 degrees two days ago to abut five during the day here and now very chilly. The evacuation centre is warm but the people in tents must be feeling it now.

Yesterday I was close to running out of gas in Ishinomaki. Amidst the rubble-an amazing sight! A garage was open! I needed to go to the toilet and was told there was no water-even now. He said he just goes back of the building. Back there it was smack right in to the debris filled mess that is now all over Ishinomaki in the afflicted areas.
I urinated looking at bits of cars in a living room.

He was quite philosophical about it all-now being so used to it. A lovely man I will remember for his humility in the face of great hardship. He filled my tank too-very much needed for these videos to be made.

April 17: After an exceedingly cold night in the truck I awaken to a sunny day. The truck was being hit by strong winds so much last night I was not sure if it was aftershocks or wind shocks! The folks in the tent town nearby must have been huddled up too.

It being palm Sunday and me being a believer I headed for Ishinomaki catholic church. Next door to it was a big evacuation centre, a middle school now full of refugees from the tsunami. Walking in I asked for n interview and the school principal kindly agreed. His name is Mr. Sakai.

Sakai sensei

He explained there are more than a hundred evacuation shelters in Ishinomaki alone. It is very hard for them all to keep connected and up to date so people in his gymnasium are still getting bread and rice balls as food delivered. This is augmented by Takidashi-a kind of mobile soup kitchen staffed by volunteers.

He showed me the following amazing newspaper article clearly marking the affected areas in red. All the red areas were devastated.

Ishinomaki news paper

He told me the school ground became a virtual island after the tsunami so over 800 people filled it the first week-many with no blankets and no food for the first few very cold days. It was snowing. Even they did not know the extent of the damage for a week as all news was cut off from them. I mentioned we probably were better informed in Canada with international news.

He then kindly showed me the gymnasium where about 200 people currently live-another 200 are spread throughout class rooms. He hopes to re-open the school on the 21st but many will have to first be re-located. Often the refugees are shuffled from shelter to shelter-they have no choice. Their houses are gone. I interviewed two of them in the shelter.

Akira and friend

Akira spoke some English and offered me a cup of coffee-it was gratefully received. I had not had any for a couple of days.He was very jovial-a self confessed ex-alcoholic he finished the talk with several Buddhist prayers (the heart sutra being the main one) that requested peace and harmony for all. He said he lacked nothing and that they were all pulling through it together. Unlike the Onagawa shelter there are no partitions here so privacy is zero. Even though the lights go out at ten people are still awake at eleven due to staying too much in the shelter and not moving about. Lack of exercise will be an issue I felt.

The lady was most worried about the radiation problem she said. She also mentioned that not doing much was a cause for concern.

I then visited the Peace Boat supply centre at the University in Ishinomaki. I met Yoshi and he said he might have a truck run for me to Fukushima next week. We will keep in touch.

Driving back by motorcycle through the rubble to Onagawa I got caught in flooded streets and was soaked by oncoming cars. At high tide the roads still flood due to subsistence of the land after the earthquake. The self defence soldiers later told me they will probably fill the sea with rubble to reclaim the land.

Returning to Onagawa at nightfall I asked the self defence soldiers to help jump start my vehicle since the battery has died. Six of them spent half an hour with me and solved the problem-caused in part by an incompletely lowered tail gate. I am now ready for the next run. It was a productive day and i found the people all round just phenomenally ‘true grit’ in their attitudes.

The Ishinomaki evacuation centre

April 18:On this trip always expect the unexpected. Just had another jolt from mother Earth-almost daily. But that was not unexpected. The unexpected was my truck battery failing me again this morning-and with only one day left. I jumped on the Kawasaki and headed into Ishinomaki in search of two new 12 volt batteries. I found them at Yellow Hat and strapped them tightly to the bike.

I filmed on the way back as usual. I took a final few shots in a ghost town.

The Onagawa tramcar

God rest their souls

One kilometer from the ocean I came across this fishing vessel and train. I realized as soon as I checked my truck I had made a serious mistake. The battery size was too large. There was no way to fit them in. The road back to Ishinomaki would be flooded again..what to do?

This morning had been the clue. For the first time since arrival I was approached by a local. He circled me like a shy child for a while. I broke the ice and met Mr. Koyama-a weather-beaten man of small build in his forties.

He told me he was going to Sendai to get a passport.He worked in the salmon business up in Alaska several months a year he said and had lost everything in the tsunami-except the most precious lives of his family. He told me that ‘the bicycle man’ in the blue tent knew all about batteries.

Fast forward seven hours and I meet Mr. Noguchi-wearing a white face mask as many do here. He immediately grasped my problem and came over to my truck.

‘You foreigners are great-you did not check the battery size before you left did you?’

Sheepishly I admitted it. ‘That is what makes you so endearing-you just seize the moment and do it anyway. No Japanese would ever do that.’ I immediately liked him. Within ten minutes we were in his beat up little truck with the two new batteries and the two old in the back heading into Ishinomaki for an exchange. On the way I got an exceptional interview with him on Iphone.

Later I will share all of it. On March 11 he had driven feverishly in front of that monstrous wave with his family in the back of an open truck the size of a minivan. He was only looking forward as he raced up the mountain road, but his wife was banging on the glass window to hurry up. She could see the wave rapidly approach them as she was facing it. What a guy! Fifty years old he has just lost everything and had no insurance-not that it would have been paid out.

On the way back he took me to Hampton Grey’s monument overlooking the bay-and the desolation below. The monument had been toppled by the seismic wave, not the liquid one, being so high up. But I saw the plaque. It seemed like a closure of sorts-just before I leave here. The road was all busted up. We had been through flooded streets on the way in and out to get those batteries from Ishinomaki.

He had them installed in minutes. Next to the truck was the Kawasaki 250 that I have ridden 2290 kilos from Kyushu. The idea was to give it to the city after using it for reporting while here. But some person must receive it for registration. Aha, I thought..

I handed him the keys. Mission accomplished. On the road again tomorrow.

April 20:Last day in Onagawa. Cloudy and cold. I stick all the loose messages into the book of Hope to present to Doi san-the mayor’s right hand man. I had done an interview with him that was truly amazing. Sitting in my truck we spent 35 minutes talking about that dreadful day. It was a sensitive interview since he had to tell me what he saw. He saw the dead bodies of many people he knew and loved being mercilessly dragged through a sea of debris, including children. It was the first time I saw him reveal the tears. But he cheered up again (as every one there must whether they like it or not -they are all crying inside every day after all) as I presented him with final gifts.

The total figures of cash donated monies collected during my lecture tour for Onagawa were given me by Mr. Doi in Onagawa after receiving them. They were as follows: (A) Tokyo talks (2 talks) 318,000 yen( B) Osaka 13,000 yen

( C) Kanezawa 46,000 yen( D) Piggy bank given by a lady in Yanagawa 18,581 yen for a total of 325,581 yen in cash. Yanagawa’s’ MARU NO KAI’ supporters will be transferring 200,000 yen from my charity talk and 500,000 yen from the office of the mayor of Yanagawa received via Mr. Tanaka. A fisherman by trade Mr. Tanaka held a charity event ‘EISAA HIBIKI KAI’ performing with Japanese drums. The Yanagawa total will be 700,000 yen plus over 400,000 yen invested in the Kawasaki 250 motorcycle presented to Mr. Noguchi on the last day as custodian for the gift to Onagawa. Many thanks to all involved in this material support. The next level is psychological and emotional support I feel.The total amount of money collected on my trip was over a million yen.

I suggested a brain trust whereby people could come to Nelson to relax and visualize the next steps with local help. This was communicated on radio too. I had an interview with Castlegar radio host Glenn Hicks expressing my ideas about using collected funds to get people out of this horrendous disaster zone so they can think again. Right now they are just battling through each day bravely with no light yet at the end of the tunnel called ‘Where do we go from here?’

I left feeling I had finally contacted their pain. I had made friends who I now feel a strong bond with. They had shared in those last two days stories of survival and grief, real shock and horror as well as that wonderfully understated Japanese spirit of gentle humility. This is how the town looked as I left:

On to Ishinomaki radio where I had a thirty minute interview with Mr. Suzuki. They will broadcast a special show on 21st about the Onagawa Nelson connection and the Hampton Gray story. I did get to see his memorial on the last evening, in three parts on the ground-felled by that earthquake.

FM Ishinomaki

I drove through Ishinomaki’s scrap to the Peace Boat volunteer centre where I spent the night again in the truck. An impossible sight met my eyes on awakening today. Was this Nelson? SNOW everywhere-the poor volunteers in tents (hundreds) had become refugees last night themselves as the fierce cold and snow piling on tents forced them into the warehouses. Today I delivered needed goods to three seniors’ facilities in the stricken zone. Driving in to Ishinomaki looked like this:

Teruko & Kimio Matsufuji

April 21: Waiting for next delivery info..

April 21:Soft gravel underfoot was not the best way to learn how to use a forklift instantly but the job did get done with help from friends. The forklift sank into snow melted earth and we had to use every strategy available to get it out-finally winching it back with a heavy machine. Then I was ready to load the fuel for self defence helicopter use. That helicopter is vital to disaster area needs. Here is the 101 forklift video. It took me several minutes to find the gears on it! We loaded 8 massive drums of aviation fuel and drove back to the self defence forces outpost at the University where Peace Boat volunteers are stationed.

April 22: I have just come from the exclusion zone perimeter at Fukushima. I drove there from Ishinomaki to report on the situation and learn the real conditions. My navigation was definitely on the spot today-just over twenty kilos from the address of the reactor I came across this road block.

Then I interviewed a very irate local who actually broke off the interview to urinate on a restaurant door before coming back for the second part. He was surely pissed off at the fact that with local number plates no Tokyo business will come near these locals. People actually write graffiti on Iwaki (local) license plates saying ‘Go home nuclear hillbillies’. Amazing what you find out when you go beyond the news into the real world..

Somebody probably called the police (I am an unusual sight at the best of times but turning up with a Japanese flag bandana in a four ton truck tends to get you noticed!) as they soon showed up to give me the once over. Very decent chaps indeed we had a rare banter together. Here is that glorious interchange of far East and far West.