A hug to keep

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I wave goodbye to Neil as he drives off on his way to Narita before flying to China. I’m on my own now if there’s another big aftershock. No, I’m not, I realise, my friends are here. Gambarou, I tell myself.

I’m in Mito station omiyage shop. It’s a very big tradition in Japan to buy omiyage – souvenirs – for your family, friends and colleagues, either when you travel away or when you’re going back home. Every station has at least one omiyage shop, and you see people laden with bags getting on the trains. First of all I look at the section with the charms and pens. I spot just what I need as an omiyage for my son-in-law who is rather partial to football - a Hello Kitty mobile phone charm showing Kitty with a headdress made up of a deer’s face and antlers, complete with red bow and holding a football. On the back of the football shirt is printed ‘Kashima’, Japan’s most successful club team, Kashima Antlers. It might not be Arsenal, but I’m sure my son-in-law will be delighted with it. Everyone in Japan seems to collect mobile phone charms. I have a Hello Kitty charm of Mito Komon, the 17th century lord of the domain of Mito, Tokugawa Mitsukini. It has a Hello Kitty face, a yellow hat complete with red bow, and 17th century dress, complete with a little bell. It hangs on my handbag which jangles as I walk. Imagine having a Hello Kitty charm of an English or British historical figure, such as Elizabeth I or the Duke of Wellington, with a Hello Kitty face complete with red bow, and you can see why I’m fascinated by Japan and love it.

I’m running round Senba Lake and my feet are brushing through the sakura petals swirling around like confetti. The trees are starting to look pinky brown now as most of the petals have blown away leaving the sepals. Fresh green trails down the willow trees. The path is full of people, families with small children, couples young and old, other joggers. Their mood seems to have lifted slightly, and I see smiles and hear laughter. It’s a wonderful sunny day and it would be safe here, whatever the earth decided to do. Nearing the hotel I run along the path next to the Sakura River. On the bank down below I count seven groups on plastic sheeting picnicking. That’s the most people picnicking that I’ve seen since I’ve been here in Mito. It’s also safe down there – nothing around which could fall on your head.

We’re sitting in Café Echelle (which means ‘ladder’) in Mito, a café done in a French way with bistro style wooden chairs and tables, and with views of the plants and scents from the flowers of the florist in the same shop. Haru-san has taken me to lots of different cafés full of individuality and character in the area. She’s telling me more about her adventurous trip back from Takahagi after the big earthquake. As the trains weren’t working at all, her sister drove over to pick her up, a distance of at least 50 km. The petrol gauge was in the red zone so they stopped at a petrol station. They had to wait for 3 hours. There wasn’t any electricity and so two of the staff were manually pumping up the petrol to each vehicle in turn, 10 litres each. On the way back home, Haru-san noticed that they had already put cones round all the obstacles in the road caused by all the damage from the earthquake.
I ask Haru-san how the children and teenagers have been coping. She tells me her nephew who is 14 said that when the earthquake happened, he was at school and all the pupils took shelter under the tables. Some of the girls were crying, he said. What about everyone’s mood now, I ask. They’re anxious with the aftershocks, Haru-san replies. The experts say they could go on a year. People are sleeping more lightly. Her brother and family live on the second floor (first floor in Europe) and about 90% of their china was broken. They’re waiting before replacing it until the aftershocks have died down.

I tell Haru-san about Keisei department store being so full yesterday, even though normally it’s relatively empty as it’s quite expensive. People don’t want to travel away from their families now with all the aftershocks, Haru-san explains. Normally they might go to Tokyo, so maybe the Keisei department store, Mito’s smartest, feels like going to Tokyo. Just like everyone else has told me this last week, Haru-san tells me that the aftershocks with Shindo 3 and 4, they’re not a problem now as they’re used to them. It’s the big aftershocks....

I’ve often heard people here, I say to Haru-san, comment that they’re lucky compared with the people in Tohoku in the north. That may be true, but everyone here has gone through more in the last month in terms of horrifying experiences than most of us will do in our whole life - the 11th March earthquake when many people feared for their lives, the damage to house and belongings, the constant battery of aftershocks, some of them huge, the terrible news about the tsunami victims, the worries with Fukushima, the first few days where you didn’t have electricity, the week or more without water, the continuous worry about aftershocks, which can be frighteningly large, the wearing continuing uncertainty, the difficulty in sleeping properly. And some people may have been feeling fragile before any of that started, as we all have periods in our lives when we feel more depressed.

Haru-san stops the car opposite my hotel to let me out. I reach across and give her a hug. I feel in a sense I’ll be deserting my friends by going back to Europe.

There’s an article in today’s Japan Times entitled, ‘Aftershocks causing earthquake sickness’. ‘Hundreds of aftershocks have rocked the ground and frayed nerves in the five weeks since the massive earthquake and tsunami, forcing survivors to relieve the terror almost daily....Many now complain of “earthquake sickness” – the sensation that the ground is swaying beneath their feet even when it is not – a condition blamed on confused inner-ear balance receptors and a heightened state of anxiety. For the tens of thousands living in Spartan and crowded evacuation shelters in and near the tsunami wastelands, the creaking of already weakened buildings and the risk of more killer waves spark mortal fears.’

As I was typing the last paragraph there was another aftershock, just a gentle one with a few vibrations and creaks. But enough to remind you of the beast’s presence. I think everyone will need lots of pink ice-cream.

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