Stories, Threads in Tohoku and Fukushima

Thinking about stories this week, I've already read quite a few recollections either through news stories or books about how people viewed the disaster and the days following. This week I decided to watch some documentaries as well because much like the Haiti earthquake, Hurricane Katrina, the war in Iraq, etc.
I hear and read a lot about it but don’t see much of it. I actually haven’t had TV since coming to college and I’ve found respite in that. I realized how much of my brain becomes inactive sitting in front of screen staring at brightly colored images move across the screen. That is not to say that the same thing doesn’t happen when I watch Netflix, but I am explicitly choosing which shows to watch and it’s hardly ever something like Gilmore Girls or whatever new sitcom cool kids watch these days. It is also a much more active decision, I have to go through the effort of signing in, decide what I feel like watching, etc. whereas in contrast with a TV, you just click on and you’re good to go.(What is channel surfing even?)

These are two documentaries that I watched that were available on YouTube as well as some footage of the incoming tsunami that was available:

• Alone in the Zone
• Tendenko
• Footage

To get an idea of where these stories fit in, I tried thinking about some of the stories that I’ve read already.

• A 14 year old who hit her head during the tsunami and survived but lost 2 years of her memory. She didn’t remember that her mother and father had divorced.
• The resilient Tohoku people who are tenacious in spite of such loss.
• The scared old woman who didn’t know what her future held if she was separated from her community, the last lifeline she had after losing her son and husband.
• A psychologist who in order to deal with her own grief, helped others by establishing a play center for children to help the mental and emotional recovery process through play therapy.
• Her husband who, while they were fairly well off, railed against the way people in this region were constantly portrayed as helpless victims as the NGOs rushed in to save them¹.
• The efficiency with which NGOs came in and aided Tohoku, so much to the point that one woman was so happy and grateful to see the volunteers come everyday to clean up her shop and home.
• The incompetence of the local governments to respond properly to the earthquake and nuclear meltdown.

These are the main threads that I am holding right now and both of these documentaries add new layers to these narratives.

Alone in the Zone follows a man who has chosen to return to the radioactive and unsafe to live in areas in Tomioka, Fukushima Prefecture, Japan.

Tomioka, Fukushima

Why would someone risk their own life and  return to a highly radioactive zone? Naoto Matsumura returned because it was “too much of a hassle” to try and go anywhere else. His family turned him away, the evacuation shelters were full, his home was still there so why not return? As the camera crew follows him you can see the place is a desolate ghost town. He recounts the suffering of the animals that were left behind to die, too contaminated to do any good now, yet he still feeds and takes care of his own. Kenji Hasegawa, another farmer in the same area talks about having to slaughter all of his cows as there was no way to keep them any longer. Naoto, when asked if he feared the radiation said that he went to get a check up and that the doctor told him he might be the person with the highest radiation levels in all of Japan, however, it would probably take 20 or 30 years before the effects like cancer set in. Already in 50s? Naoto in a light hearted tone says that it doesn’t matter because he will already be dead by then, staying and taking care of the animals is more important.

He also talks about the people’s reluctance to move. He remembers being told that everything is safe by the town mayor who he himself was convinced that everything would be okay. Even nuclear power employees he says are taught to believe that everything is entirely safe. This led to some people moving out more slowly and gaining more radiation.

This ties into two of the threads above of the ineffectiveness of local government as well as the tenacity of the people in these regions. This one man is doing what he can to make a difference, even at the risk of his health. It again echoes a sentiment that is very 日本的 or typically Japanese of old people sacrificing themselves for the greater good of all.

Tendenko follows a family that all managed to survive the tsunami by following tendenko, or prioritizing saving your own life.

Akiko Yorozu

This idea runs counter to what many people hold dear and that is caring for and protecting their loved ones. However, in the documentary, the family attributes their own success to following tendenko and increasing their each individual chance of survival rather than getting bogged down in following rules (as in the case of the son at school) or obligation to take care of the elderly (when the mother let go of grandpa’s hand). Instead they got to safety as quickly as possible and all managed to make it. Akiko Yorozu (the mom) recounts how she heard of so many of the people in her community dying, trapped in cars on their way to pick up their children from school. There are many other similar cases of one family member trying to help someone less able and they both being washed away by the  waves. What makes it so difficult for us as people in the face of real and imminent danger to abandon the notion that we must save our loved ones and by committing to that, not save ourselves?

This adds a new thread to my narratives, one of changing ideology. If the people in this region can go against the grain of something that is so fundamental in Japanese society, (albeit only really in the face of extreme danger) then possibly the minds of other people could be changed as well. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ¹ This resonates with so much that I have learned about in Anthro as well as Women’s Studies. People here in the wonderful first world need to believe that the people “over there” are poor hapless victims that need the do-gooding from them in order to recover. It is impossible for locals to have their own, effective means of coping and dealing with whatever the stressor is (tsunami, hijabs, etc.), and that there certainly isn’t a culturally appropriate way of going about helping that would be in contrast with a western way of doing things. We need to shift from “helping” and “saving”, positioning these people as passive agents to “working with”and “supporting” fully active and competent agents in their lives and recovery.