一般財団法人　連帯　東北・西南　RENTAI　TOHOKU-SEINAN

(Mr. H, Age 34, from Kanagawa)

Fishermen were cheery, but while cutting ropes for seaweed farm rafts, they told me that their struggle was in fact two years in a row as last year's Tsunami caused by the earthquake in Chile also destroyed their seaweed farms. Even so, I felt their determination to stay positive and find a way to overcome difficulties.
However, when they talked about their lives at evacuation centres, I could sense their various worries and stresses. Though what we can may be limited, I believe that it is important to go on providing support to them.

(Mr. K, Age 45, from Sendai)

As it was drizzling yesterday (11 June, 2011), all the fishermen made rafts for seaweed farms at the workshop.
While working, they chatted in their local dialect, with which they seemed to be able to express their feelings more clearly. As I understand their dialect, I could sense the immensity of the damage the earthquake brought to them.

Today (12th June, 2011), I joined a clean-up at a bathing beach. I felt at a loss seeing the enormous amount of wreckage. There would be a lot of fallen trees buried in sand, and more and more rubbles will be washed up on the beach. We must bear in mind that it will take a long time to recover the affected area.

(Mr. S, Age 41, from Saitama)

① At a workshop (Task: Rope cutting for seaweed farm rafts)
According to a fisherman, they have a goal to make 800 rafts the size of a 25 m swimming pool. When I was there, it was only about 150 rafts that had been made and their efforts still had an extremely long way to go.

②Beach clean-up

I helped to put junks on the beach in a pile. I was shocked to see three large bulk containers and four boats washed ashore. Foul smell of decayed fish was so disgusting that I could not even go close to a container which was giving off the strongest smell.

Activity description:  Administrative work (telephone operation and data entry) at "Urato Umi-no-ko Recovery Project" Head Office
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(Mr. W, Age 39, Tokyo)

I received phone calls and input the data of numerous facsimiles and letters sent by project supporters to the Head Office of Urat Umi-no-ko Recovery Project. Astonished by the huge amount of applications, I have realised an incredible number of people are actually supporting this project and that is why the fund as much as 160 million yen has been raised so far.

Activity description:  Administrative work (telephone operation and preparation for sending information materials) at "Urato Umi-no-ko Recovery Project" Head Office and beach clean-up
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(Ms. H, Age 28, Tokyo)

At the Head Office of Urato Umi-no-ko Recovery Project, I received many phone calls offering cooperation. Some left encouraging messages such as "Hang in there!", "I'd like to contribute even a little, so I'm buying one unit", "I'm happy to know my money will help Urato's fishery" and so on. One of the contributors who gave us a support call was over 80. Each time I answered such calls from all over Japan, I was overwhelmed by these people's enthusiasm to be of help to Tohoku and couldn't help but bow my head many times while talking on the phone.
I also filed a heap of facsimiled application forms for the project and input the data to the database. I  double- or even triple-checked to ensure all the information of the important contributors has been properly entered.
Some fishermen from Mie prefecture who were interested in this project visited the Head Office on the 5th June. They said that they had started preparation against possible Tokai Earthquake.