On Rikuzentakata and Volunteering

Day 3 was spent entirely on volunteering work. We went to one of the cities along the Iwate coast, Rikuzentakata. You can check Google Maps for the exact location. ;)

But before I get on with our work in Rikuzentakata, I would like to discuss a little what some of my fellow ambassadors brought up during our trip to the Tohoku region. Some of them had concerns about how the Tohoku region was trying to revive its tourism industry, especially in the wake of the recent earthquake, tsunami and the nuclear issue in Fukushima. What we noticed was that, a lot of the time, the government was trying to downplay these issues by focusing heavily on the unaffected areas. Nothing really wrong with that; I mean, its the oldest PR trick in the book. What worried the ambassadors was that its seemed like the government was forsaking these stricken areas in order to focus their tourism promotion. I guess it really appealed to our youthful sense of idealism to not forsake one for the other...

Personally, I do not think that the government is doing a wrong thing. I think it has its priorities set right actually. Reconstruction needs money. A lot of it. And besides, why do we need promotion for disaster stricken areas? Focus on getting money in, so it can flow to recovery efforts.

So back to the main topic, yes, we arrived at the Rikuzentakata volunteer center...

Banner waving in the strong sea winds..

The volunteer centre was a bustling place. Buses going in and going out, bring with them volunteers from all over.. There were Japanese people from far away prefectures, like Aichi and even international volunteers from places like South Africa! This place was basically a staging point for the volunteers to loan basic equipment like shovels and wheel carts and basically everything you need to get started. Once we got our stuff, we headed out to our designated work area. Along the way we were given masks, googles, and metal lined insoles for our shoes.

Queer looking building stand out in the middle of nowhere, probably used to be part of a harbour

Uprooted building

Along our way, we saw destruction all over the place. You can see railways tracks bring twisted like wire ties, damaged cars in fields and broken bridge railings. Thankfully the main roads have already been repaired. However, there wasn't really much of the city to see apart from the occasional uprooted building or make shift buildings for basic commerce. Makes it hard to wonder how there used to be houses there.. It just seem like was nothing there to begin with. There was however, fields and field of stacked crushed cars, wood debris, metal debris and organic debris all neatly stacked into the once rice fields probably about 3-4 stories high..

We had strict instructions not to shoot anything too detailed that might identify people or buildings so I didn't really shoot much.. Even if i wanted to, I couldn't because they did stop the bus for us to get off to shoot.. and shooting with part of the bus as the scenery isn't my cup of tea.. Personally, I think its hard to tell a story this way; you people and emotions to tell a story not only landscape shots. Maybe when I become a famous photographer they will change their mind. To be honest, we did not have any interaction at all with the people from the area and that, I felt was rather disappointing. I wanted to bring home a story about the people, their pains and resilience, but looks like they only wanted a touristy story after all. Perhaps they were afraid we will ask "the hard questions".The hard truths is hard to handle sometimes..

We eventually arrived at a deserted area along the coast. The minute we stepped off the bus, there was a pretty bad smell.. but we got used to it in 15 minutes. 

Us all geared up

Personally, the goggles was a tad redundant and the masks over kill. I think it hindered our breathing more than it protected us from dust
Nevertheless, many thanks to our sponsors for getting all these equipment for our volunteer work. Looks like they put in quite a bit of effort in planning for this. We even had insurance coverage for our volunteer work.

Debris cleared into a pile. You can see piles like this everywhere.

The trees in the background; the Japanese students who came along with us told us that the red trees were affected by the seawater and were dying. You can also see things like yukatas hanging off the tree branches which shows the height of the tsunami.

From the background you can tell that this was probably once a pretty scenic place to be. Sadly it isn't the case today. Maybe it will be again in 5 years time :). A damaged warehouse in the back.

Wooden debris. I mentioned in my previous post that Japan uses a lot of wood in their construction. There were also a lot of trees in this pile.

Disrupted Harmony, roadside

Rikuzentakata, Iwate, Japan. 28/3.5 D3

Fellow ambassador cutting a tree down using a saw on a telescopic pole with crab like claws

Our job at this site was to clear up a mud filled section of a drain for about 50 meters long

While digging, we found many things, like yakiniku sauce in large packets.. I bet it would have tasted great on our bento lunch

Dirt/rubbish goes into this white canvas-like plastic sack

Ambassadors shovelling dirt into the bag

Teamwork makes everything faster!! The Japanese students who tagged along with us (and over the next few days) also took part in the work; to be honest I think they were the most hard working..

Vampiric debris, roadside

Rikuzentakata, Iwate, Japan. 28/3.5 D3

Plants starting to grow back on loose soil

Lost, roadside

Rikuzentakata, Iwate, Japan. 28/3.5 D3

Breaking for lunch

Plaque at the volunteer centre

In total, we did a about 2-3 hours of work, excluding lunch and many had mixed feelings about this. Some commented that it was too short, some said that the work was not very meaningful and was more "for show" while others were not very interested to begin with. Of course, everyone joined this programme with varied expectations and that is not very surprising.

My take on this is pretty simple. On the issue with the short duration of the volunteer work and being not very meaningful, I would say that after all, we are not architects nor civil engineers, so we cannot construct stuff to help these people. Nor are we trained to handle heavy machinery to move piles of debris. All we can offer is whatever little manpower we can muster up and even by that standard, is rather miserable compared to seasoned labours. So is our volunteer work there futile and just as a gesture?

No. Our purpose there is not to help in the reconstruction. We are there to help bring home a story that Tohoku is safe to travel and work is being done to help the disaster stricken areas. The volunteer work was simply just a taste of what the other volunteers are doing and at the same time to see the place with our own eyes. After all most Singaporeans my age would probably have not experienced or witnessed a natural disaster. Instead of concentrating on doing manual labour (which many Singaporean youths overrate; they just want to sweat it out so they feel like they have done something. But whether that something was effective or efficient is another story) we should do something that is in our area of competence. Like for me, I try to sell my story through my photos. And this so happens to remind me of James Nachtwey's TED wish of how he wanted help to gain access to places in order for him to tell his story. I guess I sort of understand what he means now. It really is hard to tell your story with all sorts of restrictions and red tape abound. But nevertheless, I still try my best with whatever limitations I have.

My next post will be on the Sendai Tanabata Festival and on a interesting question I asked at our visit to Sendai airport, so do keep watch!!