Time has really been flying by. I can't believe it's already Wednesday.
Just a quick recap, if I never got to tell you the itinerary. I flew out of Chicago on Sunday morning, and arrived in Tokyo on Monday afternoon. Then, after a Shinkansen (bullet train) into Shibuya for a quick hello to Hachiko, I headed up to Shinjuku, for a quick bite to eat before jumping on am overnight bus (only 6 hours) to Sendai. Finally, in Sendai, I took a local bus to Ishinomaki City.
After less than a minute, I got scooped up by Naomi, one of the regulars of the It's Not Just Mud volunteer group. Once at the volunteer base of operations (two houses provided for volunteer use), I got to have a quick breakfast (rice, soup) before we headed out to help another group (a church group) dig out mud out of drainage ditches.
Today, we were the manpower for a group called Samaritan's Purse, where we were tasked to help mud out a house. Many houses in Ishinomaki City, have had their first floor heavily damaged by the tsunami. Once the water receded, they were left with a large amount of saltwater mud. Mudding out a house essentially involves removing out most of the debris and saltwater mud and disinfecting the remaining framing, leaving things nice and clean for the carpenters to do their work. A good majority of the work was already done, leaving us to just finished out shovelling and bagging up the saltwater mud from the foundation.
The homeowners happened to be present, and worked alongside us. The husband is a musician, and had his music room completely damaged, leaving minute traces of what had previously been a soundproof room with double barriers. They were kind enough to try to give us frequent breaks. Our morning break had nikuman (meat buns) and our afternoon break had fuwa fuwa bread. Lunch was free, but I'm not quite sure why that was.
Well, just tomorrow and Friday left.
More when I get a chance.
