Japan - Wednesday (Driving around some of the Tsunami area & Ishinomaki)

      We decided to rent a car for a couple of days.  It gave us a little more freedom to get around and traveling.  John drove us around some of the areas where the tsunami hit some of the towns.  It was horrible to just see everything and realize how much cleaning up they actually have to do.  You don't hear much about what's going on in Japan but it's still really devastated and lots of work needs to be done.

       As we were driving John pointed out an area that was extremely sad.....A mass grave site filled with lots  of people -- they weren't able to identify everyone so it's a graveyard filled with tons of people who will never have a grave marker and families are just assuming that their loved ones are gone.  It's just so sad to think about.

 There are bags of sludge all up and down the road....people trying to get rid of the oily mud and just try to fix up the their homes.  Also there are tons of boats behind houses, in fields and just in unexpected places.

 As we were driving we noticed that for a couple miles there were fields of rice fields that were destroyed by the tsunami but further down the road the rice fields were fine and growing.  Everyone is working hard to get life back to normal.  If you see the house....there usually isn't that much space in between houses....most of the houses got wiped out from the tsunami.

 We drove to Ishinomaki and arrived just in time for an organized meal for the people in the neighborhood.  A chef had money and wanted to cook a meal for them -- he made chicken, yakisoba (fried noodles), lamb, veggies, fruit and then at the end we had shaved ice.  They also had two ladies up from Tokyo who sang for people and entertained them. 

Some of the work that is being down in Ishinomaki is building relationships.....one of the missionary families that is helping out there has said that in the three months they have been there forming relationships and working they have made friendships that would have taken years to form.  Thankfully there have been lots of volunteers working and helping out in many different ways.

Our job was to visit with the families.  The table I sat at was with a young mom and her two daughters.  I couldn't speak much Japanese and she couldn't speak much English.  But we had fun.  I worked hard to get her youngest to smile at me.  Who knew that John could have an easier time just by giving both the girls balls.  The youngest one couldn't stop beaming after she got her ball.

 It was also fun watching Little N laugh and play with one of the little boys from the area. I just loved being able to watch them and see how language is not an issue when it comes to having fun.