Saturday, July 20, 2013

Good Morning Ishinomaki!

This is the entry and kitchen area. Joseph and Airin are sorting trash. There's a whole chart about sorting trash. It seems complicated until you figure it out and then it kinda makes sense. 
Our room and one of my roommates. Rebecca was by the window. Yumiko and I were next to each other. She was against the closet, I was against both sliding doors. One was to the bathroom, apartment door and kitchen. The other was connecting us to the girls in the other room. Lisa, Airin, Ayako, and Karin roomed together. 
We gathered out in front of the apartment every morning before piling in the van to go to our meeting of the day. 
We had our morning meetings at the Be One guest house. It was time for our team to meet together, talk and pray. We'd also get the day's jobs and or agendas. 

Shed Rebuilding

Job of the day is rebuilding a shed at the home of a hairdresser. She now has her shop at home after it was destroyed. Her home is up on a hill, but from the earthquake her shed got damaged and so did everything inside. Volunteers before us did the job of clearing the shed of it's contents that had been damaged from rain. So here we are. We split into three groups. Most of the men went up to work on reinforcing the roof. Half the girls worked on part of the shed that needed the walls boarded. I worked with Yumiko, Ayako, and Dan mixing cement. Actually it was a cement, sand and rock mixed together. We used a wheel barrow, shovel, and our gloved hands to mix it. 

Airin, Lisa, and Rebecca doing their measuring and cutting, then putting up the boards. 
The cement mixture went to the back of the shed to re-cement the ground. 
View of the roof workers from inside the shed.
Above the shed where the guys had access to the roof. 
The home owner was so kind and appreciative, she came out to give us iced coffee and tea. So yummy and refreshing! It was really nice how gracious she was, she came out to say hello, talk, and thank us a few times. 
A view of the yard and fence. I love hydrangeas, it was part of my wedding bouquet. 

Lunch Break and Back to Work

We went to lunch at an outdoor food court across the way from the Manga Museum. I wish I had a better picture of the cool architecture. It survived the tsunami intact. We were asking what the Manga Museum was (for most people the name would give it away). It's a comic museum. Cool, I can think of plenty of people that would love to visit it. 
View of the bridge, we went across it a lot to go places.
This old man biked here to fish. I wonder if he caught anything.
These construction barrier stands are so cute. Why can't we have this stuff in the US?
Having fun and getting friendly with the superhero characters. 
Ooh motorcycle, this should be Dan! 
Rowof shops and places to eat.
Mmm, lunch! With a Kirin apple pear flavored soda. So yummy. We only found it one or two other times. Wish they had it at home. 
On the way back to finish up at the house, we saw some school girls walking home. I felt like I was in one of the photos or videos you see of Japanese school girls. Kind of surreal to see it, it's not just in photos. Ha. 
Airin and Lisa finishing up their job. They were rocking the power tools by the time we were done. It was cool to watch.
Junpei (sp?) walking on the roof.
Airin in the shed that they were boarding up.
It's the afternoon and we've finished up the day's work. Ready to head back for some showers.
After lunch we didn't do any more cementing. When they told us what we were doing I was worried. I thought: Oh no, what will I do and how will I be of any help? But I was pleasantly surprised to enjoy mixing the cement a lot. I actually felt useful and helpful. It made me think of the areas in our own yard that need cementing. 
After we went to a park and lookout of the city. It was nice after work stroll. I only wish I wasn't so tired. So glad we could see and experience it though. 
As I got closer to take a photo of this, an older man with his dog came up to talk to me. I didn't even know how to communicate that I didn't understand, so he just kept talking. Good thing Junpei was standing nearby so I pulled him in. He said that the man wanted me to take a photo of something. He led us up some stairs and under a tree. I'm so glad I wasn't by myself because I had no idea where he was leading us. 
He led us to this tree and the stone under it. He told us that the writing on the stone is a poem by a famous Japanese poet and that it's really old. I forget what the name of the poet was. Maybe Yumiko will remember, she joined us to see what we were looking at. It was a beautiful tree hidden away from the path. I was happy to have a stranger come to talk to me so I could see this. Would've been nice to talk with him back. 
The views from the top at this park were amazing. There were also these photos posted of a "before" snapshot of what it used to look like before the tsunami. And you can see by my current photo, the difference in what remains. So much of it is gone. It's a sad sight even though the view was great. 
This park is where many came to seek refuge from the waters of the tsunami. Much of the footage that people took of the tsunami coming in was from here. It's hard to imagine people standing where we were watching the destruction as it happened. Such a contrast to how beautiful the park is.