古典落語「目黒のさんま」にちなんだ東京都目黒区の「目黒のさんま祭」を今年も開催することで、区と宮城県気仙沼市の実行委員会が２８日合意した。
東日本大震災で漁港が被災した気仙沼では今秋の水揚げが危ぶまれているが、関係者らは「目黒区の支援に祭りで感謝の気持ちを表したい」と張り切っている。
１５年前に始まったさんま祭は、気仙沼産の５０００匹を炭火焼きにして無料で振る舞う。この日、青木英二区長（５６）が、気仙沼市に松井敏郎・実行委員会会長（６４）を訪ね、９月開催で合意した。大津波で魚市場や漁船が破壊され、亡くなった実行委メンバーもいる。サンマを焼く台も流失した。実行委は、足りないサンマは他の漁港から取り寄せて補う考えで、目黒区も人手や道具の面で協力する。
両区市は昨年、友好都市協定を結び、区は震災以降、気仙沼市に暖房器具や食料を届け、職員も派遣してきた。松井会長は「目黒の人の思いやりと優しさを感じた。感謝の気持ちを精いっぱい表したい」と話している。
（2011年4月29日15時02分 読売新聞）
Showing posts with label Kesennuma. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kesennuma. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 10, 2011
Saturday, May 7, 2011
06/05 東日本大震災：気仙沼の被災カップル 「狐の嫁入り」挙式
うべ狐の嫁入り行列で笑顔を見せる森谷和幸さん（左）と糟谷由佳さん＝山口県宇部市で２０１１年５月５日、尾村洋介撮影
東日本大震災で被災した宮城県気仙沼市のカップルが５日、山口県宇部市であった新川市（しんかわいち）まつり（同まつり実行委主催）のイベント「うべ狐（きつね）の嫁入り行列」に参加し、市内の神社で公開結婚式を挙げた。
ともに会社員の森谷（もりや）和幸さん（２６）と糟谷（かすや）由佳さん（２８）の２人。津波で森谷さん宅は全壊し、今は糟谷さん宅で暮らすが、母親ら親族は避難所住まい。今秋予定の結婚式を実現できるか不安な思いでいた。
４月に入り、現地で活動する宇部市の復旧支援ボランティアを通じて「嫁入り行事」の開催を知った森谷さんが、実行委に参加を打診。２人を呼ぶために実行委が募った寄付金（約１２０万円）にも支えられ、既に決まっていた地元カップル１組に加え、追加婚礼が実現した。
「嫁入り行列」は、町おこしにつなげようと始まり、今回で９回目。狐の婚礼と考えられていた狐火が付近の山にともると、豊作、大漁となったという江戸時代の伝承に基づく。狐の花嫁と花婿の化粧をした２人は、気仙沼などから駆けつけた親族が見守る中、大通りを人力車で行進した。
森谷さんは「前向きに、力を合わせて、明るい家庭を築きます」。糟谷さんは「２人一緒だから大丈夫」と話していた。【尾村洋介】
毎日新聞 2011年5月6日 19時51分（最終更新 5月7日 2時43分）
Monday, May 2, 2011
01/05 東日本大震災：県立気仙沼高校野球部 早実などと練習試合
試合終了後の記念撮影で、握手を交わす気仙沼、早実両校の選手＝東京都八王子市で２０１１年５月１日午後５時５０分、久保玲撮影
東日本大震災で被災した宮城県立気仙沼高校の野球部が１日、東京都八王子市の早稲田実業学校王貞治記念グラウンドで練習試合に参加した。気仙沼高校は避難所でもあり、練習環境は限られているが、この日は早実と静岡県富士市立高校を相手に思い切りのいいプレーを披露。試合は２試合とも負けたが、選手たちは「野球をやれるありがたさを感じた」と口をそろえた。
早実戦で先発した同校３年、小野寺修平さん（１７）は自宅１階が津波で浸水。被害を免れた２階で生活を始めるまで、震災後約２週間は避難所を転々とした。地震当日は野球部の練習中で、学校で一夜を明かした。自宅や家族を失った人を目の当たりにする中で、「地域の力になりたい」と思い、市のボランティアに登録、物資の仕分けなどを手伝った。
家族を亡くした部員もおり、練習を再開したのは１カ月後。校庭は自衛隊車両が駐車しているため内野部分しか使えない。練習中に被災者から「頑張って」と声を掛けられ、「地域の思いも背負っている」と励まされた。
この日、小野寺さんは卒業生が提供してくれたアンダーシャツを着て登板。「広い環境で強豪校と対戦できてありがたい。少しでも良いプレーをして復興の力になりたい」と喜びをかみしめた。
対戦した早実３年の安田権守主将（１８）は「試合をできる喜びが伝わってきて、学ぶことがたくさんあった」と語り、部員全員で応援歌を歌いながら気仙沼高校のバスを見送った。【長野宏美】
毎日新聞 2011年5月1日 20時32分（最終更新 5月1日 20時52分）
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
27/04 Son reopens sake shop that missing father protected from tsunami
Toyoki Sugawara stands in front of a temporary building for his family's reopened sake business in Kesennuma, Miyagi Prefecture, on April 25, 2011. (Mainichi)
KESENNUMA, Miyagi -- A man here whose father disappeared in the March 11 tsunami while protecting the supplies of sake in the family's shop has reopened business at a new temporary location.
Toyoki Sugawara, 37, is the fourth generation to run the shop, which has been in business for over 90 years.
"My father protected this sake. My family and I are going to do our best to continue this business, working toward the day we can return it to the land it began on," says Toyoki.
On the day of the earthquake, Toyoki was inside the shop, which doubled as a house, when he heard an emergency radio network broadcast: "A large tsunami warning is in effect. Please evacuate to high ground."
His father, 62-year-old Toyokazu Sugawara, said to him and his 35-year-old brother Hideki, "Take one of the cars to high ground."
From the family's three cars, the brothers took one which the family had just recently bought and fled to high ground. Afterwards, the shop was struck by the tsunami.
Toyokazu had closed all six of the shops' shutters. However, the muddy waters still rushed in via the entrance of an attached storehouse, and in mere moments the waters were up to Toyokazu's waist. From the second floor, his wife Ayako, 61, descended the stairs and called for her husband. She reached out her right hand, but the moment she grabbed a hold of Toyokazu's outstretched hand, he was swallowed by the waters. They had risen in an instant.
"Run!" Ayako heard the yells of her parents-in-law, Toyotaro, 91, and Noriko, 89. She fled, heading past the second floor living room they had been in to the roof.
The next day, Toyoki and Hideki, who had spent the night on high ground, returned to the shop, which was still filled with water. On the rooftop, they saw a towel-wrapped clothes drying pole being moved around. It was Ayako, trying to signal to a helicopter that was flying overhead. The two brothers cried tears of joy in seeing she was safe.
However, Toyotaro and Noriko had passed away on the second floor, and Toyokazu had disappeared. The damage to the shop was severe, and Toyoki couldn't rally himself to try to reopen. However, regular patrons of the shop began asking when it would start again, and a construction company that had built the current shop during his father's generation offered to lend land for a temporary new building. Furthermore, although the shop had been flooded to the second floor, the stores of sake had not been carried off thanks to Toyokazu closing the shutters. Toyoki decided to reopen.
On April 23, Toyoki opened the shop for business at a temporary site consisting of a tent and prefabricated building. Having carefully cleaned off the mud that was stuck to around 300 bottles of sake and shochu liquor in the shop, Toyoki is selling them for 1,000 yen a bottle as he carries on the family business.
(Mainichi Japan) April 27, 2011
東日本大震災：「父が守った酒」再起誓う４代目 気仙沼
仮設店舗で酒店を再開した菅原豊樹さん＝宮城県気仙沼市で２０１１年４月２５日午後０時６分、小林努撮影
東日本大震災の大津波で２階までつかった宮城県気仙沼市本浜町の「すがとよ酒店」が仮店舗で営業を始めた。９０年以上続く老舗の酒を津波から守った３代目の菅原豊和さん（６２）は今も行方不明。４代目店主の長男豊樹さん（３７）は「父が守った酒。創業の地に戻るまで、何とか家族で頑張りたい」と再起を誓う。【小林努】
あの日、激しく揺れた。防災無線は「大津波警報です。高台に避難してください」。店舗兼住宅にいた菅原さんは豊樹さんと次男英樹さん（３５）に言った。「車を高台に上げろ」。３台ある車のうち、１台は買ったばかりだった。兄弟が車で高台に向かった後、津波が店を襲った。
菅原さんは店の６カ所のシャッターをすべて閉めた。しかし、濁流は棟続きの倉庫の出入り口からどんどん流れ込んだ。見る間に菅原さんの腰にまで達した。「お父さん」。２階に避難した妻文子さん（６１）が階段を下りて右手を差し出した。菅原さんが伸ばした手を文子さんがつかんだ瞬間、菅原さんは濁流にのまれた。
またたく間に増水した。文子さんは父豊太郎さん（９１）、母のり子さん（８９）の「逃げて」との叫び声で、一緒にいた２階の居間から屋上へ上がった。
高台で一夜を過ごした豊樹さん、英樹さん兄弟がまだ水につかった店に戻ると、屋上でタオルをつけた物干しざおが動いているのが見えた。文子さんが、上空を飛ぶヘリコプターに救助を求めていた。無事に、２人とも泣いた。だが、豊太郎さんとのり子さんは２階でこときれていた。
３代目は見つからず、店も損傷が激しい。豊樹さんは再開する気持ちになかなかなれなかった。それでも、お得意さんは「いつ店を始めるの」と声をかけてくれる。菅原さんの代に店を建てた建築会社は「仮店舗用の土地を貸そうか」と言ってくれた。２階まで浸水しながら、店の酒が流出しなかったのは、菅原さんが店のシャッターを閉めたからだ。豊樹さんは考え直した。「３代が守り抜いた店。自分も守らなければ」
プレハブにテントの仮店舗は２３日にオープン。残っていた日本酒と焼酎約３００本についた泥を丁寧にふき、豊樹さんは１本１０００円で店に並べた。
英訳毎日新聞 2011年4月27日 12時16分（最終更新 4月27日 12時45分）
Sunday, April 10, 2011
08/04 Lawyer devotes all to rebuild city
Shigeto Tanaka / Yomiuri Shimbun staff writer
KESENNUMA, Miyagi--A young lawyer who relocated from Osaka to Kesennuma has pledged to devote his career to restoring the city devastated by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.
The disaster damaged the home and office of Tadahiro Higashi, 33, but he was able to open a makeshift office Monday in a clothing store storage room.
Higashi moved from Osaka to Kesennuma a few years ago in the hope of helping residents in the city, which had only a few lawyers. In April 2007, he opened his practice, called the Kesennuma Himawari Fund Law Office.
Higashi has not finished cleaning his tsunami-flooded house, but he's already pledged to himself: "I'll devote my life as a lawyer to the restoration of my favorite city."
Immediately after the office reopened at 9 a.m. Monday, residents visited Higashi one after another.
"My house was washed away by tsunami," a man told Higashi with a grave look. "Where could I get financial support?"
"You'll be able to receive up to 3 million yen under the Natural Disaster Victims Relief Law if your house has been entirely destroyed," Higashi told him.
The man seemed relieved by Higashi's answer.
Higashi passed the national bar examination in 2001 and joined a law firm in Osaka. However, he began thinking he wanted to work in a place where people needed his services more.
In 2006, he applied for financial assistance from the Japan Federation of Bar Associations, which offers funds to help open law offices in areas with a shortage of lawyers.
Kesennuma has a branch of the Sendai District Court. The branch handled 587 civil and criminal cases in 2006. However, only two lawyers were practicing in the branch's jurisdiction at the time.
Higashi decided to relocate to Kesennuma because he had never lived in the Tohoku region. After opening his practice four years ago, he had no shortage of work.
On March 11, when the earthquake occurred, he was busy as usual. He was driving around Ishinomaki in Miyagi Prefecture when the colossal tsunami approached. He immediately got out of his car and evacuated to a tall building nearby.
Four days after the disaster, Higashi finally made contact with his wife Yukiko, 33, and confirmed the safety of their three children, aged 1, 3 and 5.
Higashi's office on the second floor of a commercial building in central Kesennuma was flooded by the tsunami. The first floor of his house, for which Higashi still was paying a mortgage, also was flooded.
Though still in shock, on March 24 Higashi began dispensing free legal advice to residents in Kesennuma. It was then he realized many others were affected more seriously by the disaster than he was.
"I'm wondering if the company my husband was working for might have issued inappropriate evacuation instructions and caused his death," said one woman.
Higashi advised her calmly, "There's an option to seek compensation from the company."
He could feel the pain of her sorrow and resolved to open his office to aid disaster victims as quickly as possible.
After the earthquake, Higashi asked his parents in Akashi, Hyogo Prefecture, to look after their three children. But Higashi and his wife remained at an acquaintance's house in Kesennuma.
The Higashis asked a clothing shop they knew to allow them to open a makeshift office in its storage room. They brought out wet documents and muddy desks from the damaged office, and cleaned and dried them.
On the first day Higashi resumed his legal practice, he received many phone inquiries. A large number of residents lost all their property in the disaster, and were highly likely to face financial difficulty over the prospect of having to borrow money to rebuild their homes.
Higashi decided he would not charge for legal consultations until his clients felt confident they could rebuild their lives.
"Nowadays, I feel I'm truly fulfilling my calling as a lawyer to help people who need it most," Higashi said.
He has decided to stay in Kesennuma for the rest of his life to bear witness to and play a role in the devastated city's recovery.
(Apr. 8, 2011)
KESENNUMA, Miyagi--A young lawyer who relocated from Osaka to Kesennuma has pledged to devote his career to restoring the city devastated by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.
The disaster damaged the home and office of Tadahiro Higashi, 33, but he was able to open a makeshift office Monday in a clothing store storage room.
Higashi moved from Osaka to Kesennuma a few years ago in the hope of helping residents in the city, which had only a few lawyers. In April 2007, he opened his practice, called the Kesennuma Himawari Fund Law Office.
Higashi has not finished cleaning his tsunami-flooded house, but he's already pledged to himself: "I'll devote my life as a lawyer to the restoration of my favorite city."
Immediately after the office reopened at 9 a.m. Monday, residents visited Higashi one after another.
"My house was washed away by tsunami," a man told Higashi with a grave look. "Where could I get financial support?"
"You'll be able to receive up to 3 million yen under the Natural Disaster Victims Relief Law if your house has been entirely destroyed," Higashi told him.
The man seemed relieved by Higashi's answer.
Higashi passed the national bar examination in 2001 and joined a law firm in Osaka. However, he began thinking he wanted to work in a place where people needed his services more.
In 2006, he applied for financial assistance from the Japan Federation of Bar Associations, which offers funds to help open law offices in areas with a shortage of lawyers.
Kesennuma has a branch of the Sendai District Court. The branch handled 587 civil and criminal cases in 2006. However, only two lawyers were practicing in the branch's jurisdiction at the time.
Higashi decided to relocate to Kesennuma because he had never lived in the Tohoku region. After opening his practice four years ago, he had no shortage of work.
On March 11, when the earthquake occurred, he was busy as usual. He was driving around Ishinomaki in Miyagi Prefecture when the colossal tsunami approached. He immediately got out of his car and evacuated to a tall building nearby.
Four days after the disaster, Higashi finally made contact with his wife Yukiko, 33, and confirmed the safety of their three children, aged 1, 3 and 5.
Higashi's office on the second floor of a commercial building in central Kesennuma was flooded by the tsunami. The first floor of his house, for which Higashi still was paying a mortgage, also was flooded.
Though still in shock, on March 24 Higashi began dispensing free legal advice to residents in Kesennuma. It was then he realized many others were affected more seriously by the disaster than he was.
"I'm wondering if the company my husband was working for might have issued inappropriate evacuation instructions and caused his death," said one woman.
Higashi advised her calmly, "There's an option to seek compensation from the company."
He could feel the pain of her sorrow and resolved to open his office to aid disaster victims as quickly as possible.
After the earthquake, Higashi asked his parents in Akashi, Hyogo Prefecture, to look after their three children. But Higashi and his wife remained at an acquaintance's house in Kesennuma.
The Higashis asked a clothing shop they knew to allow them to open a makeshift office in its storage room. They brought out wet documents and muddy desks from the damaged office, and cleaned and dried them.
On the first day Higashi resumed his legal practice, he received many phone inquiries. A large number of residents lost all their property in the disaster, and were highly likely to face financial difficulty over the prospect of having to borrow money to rebuild their homes.
Higashi decided he would not charge for legal consultations until his clients felt confident they could rebuild their lives.
"Nowadays, I feel I'm truly fulfilling my calling as a lawyer to help people who need it most," Higashi said.
He has decided to stay in Kesennuma for the rest of his life to bear witness to and play a role in the devastated city's recovery.
(Apr. 8, 2011)
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
22/03 「元気だった？」「何してた？」 気仙沼、小学校再開
2011年3月22日12時37分
再開した学校でうれしそうにおしゃべりを続ける子どもたち＝２２日午前９時４７分、宮城県気仙沼市の小原木小学校、高橋正徳撮影
宮城県気仙沼市唐桑町の市立小原木小学校（児童６７人）に２２日、子どもたちの元気な声や足音が戻った。震災後は休校していたが、児童にいつもの生活リズムを取り戻させてあげたい、と再開された。
２年の小松史乃さんは２２日朝、集合場所になっていた学校近くのガソリンスタンド跡地で友だちの亀谷碧海（まりん）さんを見つけ、思わず叫んだ。
「まりんちゃん！」
手を取り合って跳びはねる。地震の翌日以来の再会。「何してた？」「元気だった？」。２人のかけ合う声がいつまでも響いた。
海から３００メートルほど離れた高台に学校はある。地震の後、保護者が子どもを迎えに集まってきたが、地震の大きさに異変を感じた熊谷洋子校長らが「校庭で様子を見ましょう」と呼びかけた。直後、海側に広がる集落を、津波が襲った。学校に通う児童の２０世帯が津波で流された。幸い子どもたちと保護者は無事だったが、多くが避難所に身を寄せている。
子どもたちはこの日、集合場所から先生に連れられて学校へ。体育館で海の方を向いて黙祷（もくとう）し、熊谷校長が「たくさんの人から援助をもらっています。みんなで頑張りましょう」と語りかけた。炊き出しの給食を食べ、午後には授業も受ける。
家が流された６年の梶川裕登さんは親戚の家に身を寄せる。「学校に来て友だちの顔を見て安心した」と話した。
再開の見通しが立たない学校が多い中、避難生活を送る生徒らを集めて「超短縮授業」を開く中学校もある。
宮城県南三陸町の志津川中学校では１６日から、教室でプリント学習や読書活動を始めた。中学校に避難している生徒らが参加し、声がかかれば炊き出しや物資の運搬も手伝いながらの勉強だ。
同県女川町の女川第一中学校でも、「数学検定」の問題を解いたり、歌を歌ったりする活動を始めた。大内俊吾校長は願う。「学校の外を見れば、見たくなくても悲惨な風景が広がっている。わずかな時間だけでもリフレッシュしてほしい」
宮城県教育委員会によると、県内では少なくとも小学校４２２校、中学校２００校が震災の影響で休校した。（山本奈朱香、丸山ひかり）
.
再開した学校でうれしそうにおしゃべりを続ける子どもたち＝２２日午前９時４７分、宮城県気仙沼市の小原木小学校、高橋正徳撮影宮城県気仙沼市唐桑町の市立小原木小学校（児童６７人）に２２日、子どもたちの元気な声や足音が戻った。震災後は休校していたが、児童にいつもの生活リズムを取り戻させてあげたい、と再開された。
２年の小松史乃さんは２２日朝、集合場所になっていた学校近くのガソリンスタンド跡地で友だちの亀谷碧海（まりん）さんを見つけ、思わず叫んだ。
「まりんちゃん！」
手を取り合って跳びはねる。地震の翌日以来の再会。「何してた？」「元気だった？」。２人のかけ合う声がいつまでも響いた。
海から３００メートルほど離れた高台に学校はある。地震の後、保護者が子どもを迎えに集まってきたが、地震の大きさに異変を感じた熊谷洋子校長らが「校庭で様子を見ましょう」と呼びかけた。直後、海側に広がる集落を、津波が襲った。学校に通う児童の２０世帯が津波で流された。幸い子どもたちと保護者は無事だったが、多くが避難所に身を寄せている。
子どもたちはこの日、集合場所から先生に連れられて学校へ。体育館で海の方を向いて黙祷（もくとう）し、熊谷校長が「たくさんの人から援助をもらっています。みんなで頑張りましょう」と語りかけた。炊き出しの給食を食べ、午後には授業も受ける。
家が流された６年の梶川裕登さんは親戚の家に身を寄せる。「学校に来て友だちの顔を見て安心した」と話した。
再開の見通しが立たない学校が多い中、避難生活を送る生徒らを集めて「超短縮授業」を開く中学校もある。
宮城県南三陸町の志津川中学校では１６日から、教室でプリント学習や読書活動を始めた。中学校に避難している生徒らが参加し、声がかかれば炊き出しや物資の運搬も手伝いながらの勉強だ。
同県女川町の女川第一中学校でも、「数学検定」の問題を解いたり、歌を歌ったりする活動を始めた。大内俊吾校長は願う。「学校の外を見れば、見たくなくても悲惨な風景が広がっている。わずかな時間だけでもリフレッシュしてほしい」
宮城県教育委員会によると、県内では少なくとも小学校４２２校、中学校２００校が震災の影響で休校した。（山本奈朱香、丸山ひかり）
.
Sunday, March 20, 2011
19/03 ‘Too Late’ for Some Tsunami Victims to Rebuild in Japan
March 19, 2011
By MICHAEL WINES
KESENNUMA, Japan — A week after the tsunami obliterated most of this northern Japanese city’s seafront and not a little of its inland, the first handful of shopkeepers and their employees were outdoors shoveling mud and hauling wreckage from their businesses, signs of rebirth after this region’s worst catastrophe in memory.
Kunio Imakawa, a 75-year-old barber, was not among them.
Mr. Imakawa and his wife, Shizuko, lost his three-chair barber shop, their second-floor apartment and all their belongings in the tsunami. Rebuilding would mean starting from scratch. And he said that simple math, calculated in yen and in years, showed it was not worth the effort.
“Young people would think, ‘Maybe there’s another way,’ ” he said last week as he sprawled with 1,600 other refugees in a chilly local sports arena. “But I’m too old. My legs have problems.
“It’s too late to start over.”
And as this rural corner of northeastern Japan tries to start over, his spent resilience is a telling indicator of the difficulties ahead. Well before disaster struck, this region was an economic and social laggard, leaching people and money to Japan’s rich urban south, sustained — even as opportunity moved elsewhere — by government largess and an unspoken alliance with the nuclear-power industry.
Now a week of calamity threatens to upend those compacts, with unpredictable consequences.
“The young people left these rural communities long ago for jobs in Sendai, in Tokyo and in Osaka,” said Daniel P. Aldrich, a Purdue University professor who is an expert not only on the region’s economy, but also on the aftereffects of natural disasters like the tsunami.
“These are declining areas. With an exogenous shock like this, I think it’s possible that a lot of these communities will just fold up and disappear.”
Some have been hollowing out, albeit slowly, for a long time. Japan’s population as a whole is shrinking and graying, but the Japanese prefectures hardest hit by the tsunami — Miyagi, Fukushima and Iwate — often outpace the national trends, and their workers’ average incomes are shrinking as well.
Kesennuma’s home prefecture, Miyagi, claims one comparatively prosperous hotspot: its capital, Sendai, a million-person city that boasts some technology firms and a far younger population. But even Sendai has prospered at the expense of the surrounding countryside, which is significantly poorer and older.
Less than 19 percent of Sendai residents are older than 64, below the 22 percent national average. In contrast, over-64 citizens officially make up nearly 27 percent of Kesennuma’s population, and city officials say the total is closer to 30 percent.
People — especially young people — are leaving for the same reason as migrants everywhere: they see fewer opportunities here than in Japan’s bigger, flashier cities. For centuries, inland residents farmed and coastal residents fished. Over the years, farming declined in importance, and village fishermen have increasingly been routed by huge and more efficient factory ships.
“It’s a declining industry. That was so before the tsunami,” said Satsuki Takahashi, a University of Tokyo cultural anthropologist who has long studied the coastal villages in the tsunami area.
Unable to compete, but saddled with debt from purchases of boats and equipment, many fishermen troll in small boats near the coast, catching just enough to pay their bills.
“It’s usually the case that the first son has to stay with the home,” Ms. Takahashi said. “Those who can leave town are the second and third sons or daughters. Many of them do.”
Like governments everywhere, Tokyo has tried to manage the region’s decline. For pensioners — retired fishermen, and folks like Mr. Imakawa who serve them — there is a generous tax break for people who operate even marginal businesses from their homes. Japan’s small towns are filled with first-floor shops below second-floor apartments.
For job-hungry workers, Mr. Aldrich says, the government took another tack: it promoted the construction of nuclear power plants along the coast. Two reactor complexes were built in Fukushima Prefecture; one in Miyagi, near Sendai.
“There’s really no economic engine in these communities,” said Mr. Aldrich, whose 2010 book “Site Fights: Divisive Facilities and Civil Society in Japan and the West” details the government’s strategy for locating reactors in struggling areas. “These facilities bring $20 million or more to depopulating, dying towns. Many people saw these power plants as economic lifelines at a time when their towns are dying.”
And they were, until an earthquake and tsunami changed the economic equation last week.
Now at least one of the Fukushima complexes appears destined never to reopen. Part of the prefecture could remain off limits for years because of radiation. The future of similar plants could be thrown into doubt, along with the jobs and supporting businesses that sprung up around the nuclear industry.
At the same time, the tsunami wiped out thousands of businesses and tens of thousands of homes, many of them owned by retirees who lack the spirit or money to rebuild. And Mr. Aldrich — also the author of a long-term study of the societal impact of major disasters like Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans — says the dislocation caused by the tsunami threatens to permanently rend the social fabric that keeps many coastal villages afloat in hard times.
Whether disproportionately elderly coastal towns will be resilient enough to absorb such blows is an open question. Whether Japan’s central government, already facing unprecedented debt, can afford to take on a colossal reconstruction of marginally economic areas is another. And then there is a third question: whether, in political terms, it can afford not to.
“We faced exactly the same question after Katrina,” said John Campbell, an expert on aging at the University of Michigan and visiting scholar at the University of Tokyo. “There was a big discussion about whether we should rebuild the Ninth Ward, since it was below sea level, and so on. In terms of economic rationality, it didn’t make any sense, really. But on the other hand, it’s where these people lived, and there were emotional reasons to do it.
“These villages may not have the same sentimental attachment. Nonetheless, there’s an emotional argument that’s going to be made, and I think it will be a potent one.”
Moshe Komata contributed research.
By MICHAEL WINES
KESENNUMA, Japan — A week after the tsunami obliterated most of this northern Japanese city’s seafront and not a little of its inland, the first handful of shopkeepers and their employees were outdoors shoveling mud and hauling wreckage from their businesses, signs of rebirth after this region’s worst catastrophe in memory.
Kunio Imakawa, a 75-year-old barber, was not among them.
Mr. Imakawa and his wife, Shizuko, lost his three-chair barber shop, their second-floor apartment and all their belongings in the tsunami. Rebuilding would mean starting from scratch. And he said that simple math, calculated in yen and in years, showed it was not worth the effort.
“Young people would think, ‘Maybe there’s another way,’ ” he said last week as he sprawled with 1,600 other refugees in a chilly local sports arena. “But I’m too old. My legs have problems.
“It’s too late to start over.”
And as this rural corner of northeastern Japan tries to start over, his spent resilience is a telling indicator of the difficulties ahead. Well before disaster struck, this region was an economic and social laggard, leaching people and money to Japan’s rich urban south, sustained — even as opportunity moved elsewhere — by government largess and an unspoken alliance with the nuclear-power industry.
Now a week of calamity threatens to upend those compacts, with unpredictable consequences.
“The young people left these rural communities long ago for jobs in Sendai, in Tokyo and in Osaka,” said Daniel P. Aldrich, a Purdue University professor who is an expert not only on the region’s economy, but also on the aftereffects of natural disasters like the tsunami.
“These are declining areas. With an exogenous shock like this, I think it’s possible that a lot of these communities will just fold up and disappear.”
Some have been hollowing out, albeit slowly, for a long time. Japan’s population as a whole is shrinking and graying, but the Japanese prefectures hardest hit by the tsunami — Miyagi, Fukushima and Iwate — often outpace the national trends, and their workers’ average incomes are shrinking as well.
Kesennuma’s home prefecture, Miyagi, claims one comparatively prosperous hotspot: its capital, Sendai, a million-person city that boasts some technology firms and a far younger population. But even Sendai has prospered at the expense of the surrounding countryside, which is significantly poorer and older.
Less than 19 percent of Sendai residents are older than 64, below the 22 percent national average. In contrast, over-64 citizens officially make up nearly 27 percent of Kesennuma’s population, and city officials say the total is closer to 30 percent.
People — especially young people — are leaving for the same reason as migrants everywhere: they see fewer opportunities here than in Japan’s bigger, flashier cities. For centuries, inland residents farmed and coastal residents fished. Over the years, farming declined in importance, and village fishermen have increasingly been routed by huge and more efficient factory ships.
“It’s a declining industry. That was so before the tsunami,” said Satsuki Takahashi, a University of Tokyo cultural anthropologist who has long studied the coastal villages in the tsunami area.
Unable to compete, but saddled with debt from purchases of boats and equipment, many fishermen troll in small boats near the coast, catching just enough to pay their bills.
“It’s usually the case that the first son has to stay with the home,” Ms. Takahashi said. “Those who can leave town are the second and third sons or daughters. Many of them do.”
Like governments everywhere, Tokyo has tried to manage the region’s decline. For pensioners — retired fishermen, and folks like Mr. Imakawa who serve them — there is a generous tax break for people who operate even marginal businesses from their homes. Japan’s small towns are filled with first-floor shops below second-floor apartments.
For job-hungry workers, Mr. Aldrich says, the government took another tack: it promoted the construction of nuclear power plants along the coast. Two reactor complexes were built in Fukushima Prefecture; one in Miyagi, near Sendai.
“There’s really no economic engine in these communities,” said Mr. Aldrich, whose 2010 book “Site Fights: Divisive Facilities and Civil Society in Japan and the West” details the government’s strategy for locating reactors in struggling areas. “These facilities bring $20 million or more to depopulating, dying towns. Many people saw these power plants as economic lifelines at a time when their towns are dying.”
And they were, until an earthquake and tsunami changed the economic equation last week.
Now at least one of the Fukushima complexes appears destined never to reopen. Part of the prefecture could remain off limits for years because of radiation. The future of similar plants could be thrown into doubt, along with the jobs and supporting businesses that sprung up around the nuclear industry.
At the same time, the tsunami wiped out thousands of businesses and tens of thousands of homes, many of them owned by retirees who lack the spirit or money to rebuild. And Mr. Aldrich — also the author of a long-term study of the societal impact of major disasters like Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans — says the dislocation caused by the tsunami threatens to permanently rend the social fabric that keeps many coastal villages afloat in hard times.
Whether disproportionately elderly coastal towns will be resilient enough to absorb such blows is an open question. Whether Japan’s central government, already facing unprecedented debt, can afford to take on a colossal reconstruction of marginally economic areas is another. And then there is a third question: whether, in political terms, it can afford not to.
“We faced exactly the same question after Katrina,” said John Campbell, an expert on aging at the University of Michigan and visiting scholar at the University of Tokyo. “There was a big discussion about whether we should rebuild the Ninth Ward, since it was below sea level, and so on. In terms of economic rationality, it didn’t make any sense, really. But on the other hand, it’s where these people lived, and there were emotional reasons to do it.
“These villages may not have the same sentimental attachment. Nonetheless, there’s an emotional argument that’s going to be made, and I think it will be a potent one.”
Moshe Komata contributed research.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)