A month has passed since the Great East Japan Earthquake struck, leaving more than 13,000 people dead and nearly 14,000 missing. In disaster-hit regions and across Japan, silent prayers were dedicated to the numerous victims who lost their lives on March 11.
A large number of people joined hands in front of Okawa Elementary School in Ishinomaki city, Miyagi Prefecture, where many schoolchildren died. Ren Sato, who used to attend the school as a first-grader, stepped into a field of rubble where it once stood and offered a bouquet of flowers in memory of his lost friends.
Members of the Self-Defense Forces and firefighters, clearing rubble in the disaster areas, also stopped to join hands and pray.
At numerous school gymnasiums that were turned into evacuation shelters, disaster victims prayed in silence when a signal was made at 2:46 p.m.
Shoko Kobayashi and her 11-year-old brother, Ryuichi, at the moment the magnitude-9.0 quake struck the month before, paused to remember their father, who was killed by the tsunami.
"I used to promise to my father that I would be a beautician and that he would be my first customer," the 17-year-old said. "It's like as if he would come back at any moment and say, 'Hi, I'm back,' and I can hardly believe that he's gone. But I know I should smile and try to give my family strength."
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