地震

I am okay.

Thank you for all your concern, and I really mean that. I am fine, Nagoya is fine, my friends are fine. We have been going about our daily routines as usual. Classes are still being held with no signs of change. Nanzan University and my program are running business as they always have, and have assured everyone that Nagoya is in no immediate danger and evacuation is not necessary. I'm on spring break, and the four of us got back from Kyoto a couple of days ago. Everything is still open, people are still shopping and eating out and living their lives.

But up north the images are much, much different, and the sense of detachment that comes from living in Nagoya and yet knowing that, 270 or so miles north of this city, entire towns don't exist anymore and people are freezing, starving and wandering around with nowhere to go, is scary and frustrating at the same time. My heart goes out to those people, to that part of this country that I have been calling home for years and years. They have been here much longer than I have, and this disaster has affected them in the most direct and terrible way.

I read the news every day, morning and night, whenever I can. And by the news I mean practically every resource of information available. I'm reading American news (and I'm disappointed in it, but more on that later), I'm reading the BBC, I'm reading Al Jazeera, I'm reading the Japan Times and NHK World and bravenewclimate.com (for the science stuff; it's an incredibly honest resource) and the military newspaper, Stars & Stripes. I'm trying to be informed not only because I live here, but because I don't want to leave. And I know inherently that there's no reason for me to go because I am safe in this city, but I have to know why.

Here's what happened, from my point of view:

On Friday, around 3 PM, my entire Japanese Politics class thought we were all having vertigo until someone noticed the blinds swaying. It was an aftershock of the 9-magnitude earthquake off the coast of Sendai, though we didn't know that until much later. At the time we simply stayed in our seats and just waited it out. The aftershock lasted about a minute--the longest earthquake I've ever felt in my 7ish years here.

Then an announcement came over the loudspeaker, the same one three times in a row, saying that the quake we'd just experienced had been a 3 on the Japan scale, which is about a 5 on the Richter scale. The end of the announcement said, "Everyone, please calm down."

I received a text from that moment from Massiel in the computer lab that read, "That was an aftershock from an 8.7 in Tokyo."

My teacher tried to go on with class after telling us a couple of earthquake stories, but we had another tiny aftershock after the first one--this one lasted about 10 seconds. This time we could tell that something was out of place. Soon enough one of the administrators from the exchange student program came by our classroom to tell our teacher that northern Japan had just had a massive earthquake; at the time it was a 6 on the Japan scale, which is about an 8 on the Richter.

Our teacher told us that the epicenter was apparently Sendai; Massiel texted me again to say she'd heard it was Morioka, which is roughly in the same region.

At this point class was actually over, and Rachael and I started texting people we knew in Tokyo and Sendai to see if they were okay. They received our texts sporadically; my friend didn't get hers until later that night, Rachael's text arrived at its connecting phone about an hour after she'd sent it.

At this point my brother called, saying he'd already had about half our family call him because they couldn't reach me--I'm still not sure why, because he lives in Hawaii, but....anyway, he asked if I was alright and I told him that yeah, we'd had an aftershock but that was all. He asked if we were being evacuated, if there were any plans to move us out, if the school was doing anything. I said no, because that was the truth.

Rachael went home. I met up with Massiel in my dorm and called her dad and my parents through Skype in my room (she wasn't allowed to come up with me; it's dorm policy). It was around 2 AM in the States, but everyone was awake. My mom said she'd had people call her already asking how I was. My dad said he was watching the news but knew I was fine. Massiel's dad hadn't heard about the earthquake, but he said he would call her mom and tell her she was fine.

Then I went downstairs and Massiel and I watched the news. We watched the tsunami footage--Sendai Airport engulfed by debris and water, entire homes off the coast being swept away like nothing, cars floating along the waves like they were weightless. We watched the fires, everything on fire, buildings and ports and homes. We watched the earthquake footage from the NHK office in Sendai over and over again, so many times that we could count the seconds until the woman grasped the table to keep herself steady as cabinets flung open and books and papers fell to the floor.

As the hours passed, the details became clearer. We learned of the real epicenter, the real magnitude (that was soon to increase) and of the immediate damage in Northern Honshu. Massiel and I had dinner out that night, and every television screen in the restaurant had a color-coded, flashing map of Japan indicating tsunami warnings. Nagoya was pink; we had a chance of a tsunami. But really, we're too high above sea level for anything to hit past the port.

After that I can't remember days, only moments. I don't keep a diary, I just go with the days, and all I can I recall now are news articles and more earthquake footage and my deep desire to do something. All I've done so far is donate, and I know the money counts, but for awhile--and even now--I still want to go to the Tohoku region and just help. Clear rubble. Give out food. Help the lost. Help the lonely. Give out blankets. Find shelter for those who don't have any. Give a prayer, an outstretched hand, a smile. Give something positive. Because I might just be an idealist, but I still believe in the power of positivity.

And then the nuclear reactor situation started to grow out of control in the hands of the media, and I spent most of my days frustrated because Western journalism portrayed the occurrence as the imminent death of Japan. But it wasn't. From the beginning it was a problem, yes, and a very serious one at that. Then it took a turn for the worse and I can't say I wasn't worried. But the way the Western media told the story, it was "The entirety of Japan is affected, radiation is spreading throughout the country and there will be a nuclear meltdown. Everyone will have to be evacuated." I've heard stories that this was going to be the next Chernobyl, that I would not be able to eat the food here anymore, that the wind would blow nuclear fallout directly to my doorstep. According to a number of supposedly trustworthy news sources, the Fukushima nuclear situation was the near-end of Japan.

But it wasn't. It isn't. It is still a big problem and it is still underway (though recently coming under more control). From the start, however, the whole of Japan was never affected, nor about to be affected, by any sort of nuclear fallout. The case is localized to the Fukushima area and its surroundings in a 30-50 kilometer range, and maybe a little more than that, but barely beyond. Radiation levels outside of the area are totally safe and are background, which is no more than what one receives from the natural environment. Tokyo, while experiencing food/gas shortages and blackouts, is actually completely safe from any health concerns caused by radiation.

I am disappointed that a large number of the foreign population has shifted their attention to the nuclear reactors when in fact the real disaster lies, as it always has, in the earthquake-damaged areas. I'm not saying that people have completely forgotten about it; I know that's not the case at all. But there are so many who are solely preoccupied by the reactor situation--something they can't help in any way--that they're no longer thinking, at least in the forefront of their minds, about the people up north who no longer have food, water, shelter, family or even a town to call home because it was entirely destroyed by the tsunami.

Instead, the Western media has propagated a sense of panic. Because of that panic, numerous colleges have terminated their programs for fear of nuclear fallout in areas 250+ miles away from Fukushima, though geographically and scientifically such a happening is nearly impossible. Because of that panic, nearly 8000 people have chosen to depart from US military bases on mainland Japan.

And for what? Safety, when nothing was really happening in the first place? Caution, when all signs point to safety in the areas outside of Fukushima and its evacuation zone?

(Though to believe in blind safety is, of course, wrong. Food is contaminated, after all, and so is the tap water in some areas. Being informed and knowing what's harmful and what isn't is crucial. But simply walking outside in Tokyo will not give you any risk of breathing in dangerous amounts of radiation.)

I am not leaving until the US Embassy or Nanzan University (which issued a statement instructing exchange students to inform their parents and home universities that Nagoya is safe and not in any danger) tells me I have to. UNC has requested that I come home, but I said no. I believe I am in no imminent danger by staying here, and unless the time comes that I am and it is in my best interest to evacuate, I will not leave before May 22nd.

Meanwhile, nearly half of the CJS exchange student program has gone home involuntarily due to terminations. According to what I've heard from other universities in the area, some students are even being threatened with expulsion if they don't return home. I have friends waiting out the situation in China and other areas of Asia, with either round-trip tickets back to Nagoya or plans to return as soon as the situation clears up.

This is far from over. The number of dead and missing has topped 21,000, and it rises every day. When I pass magazine racks all I see are photos of the destroyed areas; entire cities flattened to dust and rubble. I don't turn on the television any more because I know I won't be able to watch anything but the news--not because there isn't anything else on, but because I will only feel like watching the news. When I talk with my friends we always end up discussing the aftermath of the quake and the Fukushima situation.

And yet everything that has happened in the last seven or so days has amazed me in the way one takes in a world of things, closes their eyes, takes a deep breath and looks up again only to find that Japan is doing its very best to recover from a natural disaster that nearly stripped all feelings of hope from an entire country. Nearly, but not.

So I donate--time, money, thoughts. I stay informed. I pray. And I ask you to do the same.

バレンタインの日

It started out as a joke.

The first time we went to Daikoku and thus sold our souls to a bunch of wonderful boys (some of whom, by the way, we now have outside-of-work correspondence with!), one of us brought up the idea that we could give them chocolate for Valentine's Day. That was in January, and Feburary the 14th seemed so far away that we dove into that fantasy like nobody's business. After all, it wasn't like we were actually going to go through with it. For the rest of the month it became another one of our too-numerous inside jokes: remember that time we said we were going to give chocolate to Daikoku on Valentine's Day? We gave the idea sparkles, put a ring on it, drove it home and made it dinner, painted it with elaborate pastry ideas and sprinkles and letters full of why you guys so awesome though?s.

Nobody actually thought we were going to go through with it (aloud, anyway).

But by the time Valentine's Day actually rolled around, it wasn't so much of a joke anymore, and on the morning of that Monday--thank goodness we were still on February break--we trooped to the sticks of Nagoya, also known as Toyota (yes, everyone! It's a real city!), to make Valentine's Day pastries...for a bunch of waiters (though I hesitate to call them that) who didn't know what hit them when the four of us walked into their bar/izakaya/restaurant-thing that first day. To be fair, we didn't know either. But this study abroad experience wouldn't be the same without them, that's for sure.

Anyway--it's not mushy time yet. First, an explanation of Valentine's Day in Japan, told through a comparison of Valentine's Day in America.

WHEN IT'S VALENTINE'S DAY AND YOU'RE:

- a single woman in America, you go about your normal day. Or you have a little rant about how ridiculous this so-called "holiday" is. Or you go out with your girls and make fun of all the couples having a romantic dinner/walking around being all snuggly and cute. Or you buy chocolate for yourself, eat all of it in one sitting, feel sick and curse February the 14th.

- a single man in America, you--well, I don't actually know. Most of the guys I know wake up and don't even realize it's Valentine's Day.

- dating in America, you have a nice day with your significant other doing whatever makes the both of you happy, like endless games of Scrabble (hey, I'd be thrilled).

- a single woman in Japan, you feverishly make chocolates--yes, you MAKE chocolates--or pastries or cake or cookies or some kind of delicious sweet thing either the day of Valentine's Day or a couple of days before. The entire time, you practically sweat sparkle-filled, manga-flower vibes of nervousness and thoughts of OH MY GOD WILL HE ACCEPT MY FEELINGS? If you're a single woman making romantic chocolate for the man of your dreams/that kid next to you in math class you draw comics about, you're not just making chocolate for the hell of it. In Japan, Valentine's Day is a day for women to give their feelings away in a box tied with a ribbon. The department stores are practically OVERFLOWING with gourmet chocolates, gift ideas, gift boxes and chocolate-making materials; suddenly everyone remembers their favorite anime/manga/drama scene where the heroine, blushing furiously, thrusts a box of chocolate in the face of the boy she likes and says, "Please accept this!" Japan took Valentine's Day and marketed it to women like never before. If you try to escape it, there will be consequences.

(On the other hand, it's also a custom to give your guy friends chocolate--aka, non-romantic chocolate. That's called ぎり/giri chocolate, and at the very basic level it means 'obligation chocolate.' For giri, you make chocolate because you want to, and you give it to whomever you want to, even your own girl friends. There's no blushing and no "please accept this!"--unless you're us.)

- a single man in Japan, you eat chocolate (if you get any) and start thinking about White Day, which is exactly a month after Valentine's--March 14--and it's when the guy gives chocolate/a present back to the girl if he accepts her feelings (or if he just wants to in the case of giri, because they're friends/it's the nice thing to do/why not). The department stores have been advertising White Day since the end of February, and there's not only an impressive array of chocolate that I could only afford if I sold my leg, but there are also stuffed animals! I mean, I was excited about it...

- dating in Japan, you parade your love to the masses by strutting about in public holding hands and walking beside each other attached at the hip. Here, that's practically PDA.

Did you get all of that? There will be a test.

For Daikoku we decided to go with the whole 'this is giri, you guys are cool, thanks for always being awesome! This is how gaijin make friends!' kind of thing (it actually said that in our letter). I mean, maybe there's one specific staff member I would have liked to give real chocolate to, but we're not going to get into that now. Or any other day, actually. Let me pine in peace.

Our menu included the following: orange sugar drop donuts and brownies, to be put in cute pink baggies bought at the hundred yen store (we were going to go with boxes at first, but when I got there each box had to be bought individually and we needed 14 of them--I love those guys, but I am a poor ryugakusei [exchange student] and do not have 1400 yen to spend on boxes the size of my palm).

But as these things go, luck was not entirely on our side.

First off, Massiel had come down with some strange sinus/infruenza-like illness the day before and by the sheer power of Sports Drink (no really, her host mom handed her a huge bottle with a label that said Sports Drink) and love for Daikoku, she managed to get rid of the fever. She was still somewhat sick, though, and had to wear a mask throughout the pastry-making session. Secondly, the brownies WOULD NOT COOK THROUGH no matter how long we kept them in the oven. The top would burn but the middle would be mush. :( The donuts also weren't cooking correctly--the oil kept heating up too fast and we would get black drop donuts with gushy orange insides. Not exactly appetizing. And to top it all off, it started raining outside, huge snowy-like chunks of freezing cold water.

But time does great things. We managed to get a batch of brownies that were cooked through (though we had to slice off the top) and also had reinforcement brownies that Rachael had brought (sssh, don't tell. They were still handmade; it's okay!). The orange drop donuts finally started doing what I wanted them to, and we had enough batter left over to make a nice amount. And Massiel's illness did not rear its ugly head again (oh, the power of love and Sports Drink).

After a walk to the station in the snowy rain and discovering that, because it had gotten wet, the bag we'd put the pastries in had a small tear in it, we finally got on the train to Kanayama....

...As nervous wrecks. It didn't start that way, but by the time we were only a couple of stops away I was getting pretty anxious, and Grey was too. Massiel had been that way from the start, and Rachael told us en route that we were making her nervous. There wasn't really anything to be nervous about--either they took what we had to give them or didn't. But we'd already dug ourselves into a big, big hole of what-ifs that we couldn't climb out of it anymore, and at the same time, we'd already come so far that we couldn't go back.

In the end, we arrived at Daikoku with a wet, torn (though still mostly sturdy) bag full of pastries. We'd battled snow-rain and the freezing cold and too many mishaps, but we were there.

I can't remember if there was anyone greeting in front. At any case, we walked in, said our hellos, and decided that we were going to give them the goods later....

...at the appropriate time...

...whenever that time was.

I mean sure, we could have thrust the bag at Ryou-kun (who was working that day and took our first order) and been like, "HERE, CHOCOLATES! TAKE THEM!" But that would have required guts, which we didn't really have at the time. So we ordered our drinks and then pouted at each other, because apparently pouting gives answers.

As we were pouting, I started reading the boards they have on the wall. Not the ones with the Daikoku story on it, but the ones with the specials of the day and the staff recommendations. Underneath the specials, there was a little drawing of a pig as cupid and then a small, almost unnoticeable note:

チョコください！

Which means choco kudasai or 'give us chocolate, please.'

THEY HAD BASICALLY GIVEN US AN IN. Immediately the pouts were replaced with sounds of enlightenment (which in our case are usually things along the lines of "Why so genius though?" and "OH MY GOD"), because Daikoku hadn't just made things easier for us--they'd given themselves away. Oh, you want chocolate? We'll give you chocolate. We got it right here.

At that moment Ryou-kun came over with a plate of liver sashimi (sliced, raw liver--I know that sounds gross, but it's actually delicious), holds a finger to his lips and says, "Ssssh!" Free food. Oh, that man. I adore him.

And then I go, "So, you know how on that board it says you want chocolate...?"

He says yes. I mean, if he hadn't--but.

"Well, we actually made chocolate for you..."

And I hand him the bag.

He was the cutest, most surprised person on the earth at that moment. So was Yuuta in the background. It was a chorus of "Ehhhhhhh!?"s and "Oh wow, really?"s and general disbelief. Seriously though, it wasn't like we'd given them phantom pastries--they existed. The bag was in Ryou-kun's hands. We were fifteen year old girls again, suddenly, and asking boys our age (because we discovered that they are!) to accept our feelings for them even though technically it was giri.

And then--oh. And then Ryou-kun turns around, pumps his fist in the air and yells, "WE GOT CHOCOLATE!!!!!!"

Cue a round of applause, more "Ehhhhh!?"s, every one of the staff members thanking us and the entire bar turning round to stare at the four gaijin who'd made the staff members of Daikoku pastries for Valentine's Day.

We exploded.

"I'm just gonna, uh," I said, and tried to pick up another piece of sashimi but physically just could not, "eat. Wait--I can't."

"Well, I'm gonna eat," Rachael said, but only because she couldn't bring herself to face the applause from random strangers.

"Did we just do that?" someone else said.

"Yeah. That happened."

Story of our lives. Did that just--? Yeah. It happened.

We'd also included a letter in our package that had a drawing of us and then our names because, if you can believe it, they didn't know them. We knew theirs, and their ages, and everything else about them thanks to profiles put up in the bathroom (don't ask--Owner's fault), but they didn't know anything about us.

So after the applause fiasco and outing ourselves as Those Girls, Ryou-kun came over a little later while Massiel is in the bathroom and said, all sing-song, "I know your names!"

We gave him a little test.

"Melissa-chan," he said. (I died.)

"Rachael," he continued.

"Grey-san." (Or -chan. Some suffix. We couldn't tell.)

"And...Ma-massiel?"

He struggled a little bit with hers, but got it in the end. A+, Ryou-kun!

Then Owner came over, asked us if the pastries were handmade, and blew us all kisses when we said yes. That man.

Also, Yuichi cooking at the grill, then looking up at us with the hugest grin to show off his English skills: "I love you."

We'd met him for the first time that night. Daikoku, you employ the most charming of boys.

At the end of the night, Ryou-kun showed us to the door (they always do that) and bowed a full 90 degrees to show his gratitude. We were basically humbled to the point where we were like, "NO, GET UP, THAT'S TOO DEEP A BOW, WE JUST MADE YOU CHOCOLATE, IT'S NO BIG DEAL!"

Then we asked him if we were allowed to call him Ryou-kun.

"Of course," he said, smiling. "But...how do you know our names?"

Everyone sighed.

"They're in the bathroom," I said, and he proceeded to laugh. Like he'd forgotten. I mean, I would remember if my boss posted my biography on a wall in the bathroom, but still....also, Yuuta told us everyone's name on the very first day.

"Call us all by our first names!" he said. "If you want anything, yell my name across the room!"

And then he waved us off (with a "じゃ、また!" which is how you'd say "see you next time!" to your friends) and we proceeded to run down the stairs and shriek our happiness down the sidewalks of Kanayama.

Can you blame us? (The answer, in fact, is no.)

Unfortunately I don't have any pictures from this night except for when we were making the pastries, and those are relatively boring because they're just--batter and orange zest in bowls and so on. So you're free to imagine your own visuals. Just don't forget to add the sparkles.

(As a post-note: the ones who weren't working that night thanked us the next time we came. Except for one, who needed a little prodding, but that's a story not worth my writing down. Secondly, we are now on a first-name basis with all of the boys, including Owner, who especially likes to call Rachael's name from across the room. And besides that, we've established some outside-of-work communication and even plans. The Daikoku Saga continues...)