Japan, How it is - How to Volunteer in Touhoku

This is the supplemental video to my Previous Volunteering Video 

In this one, I give you all the info you need to know about volunteering.

It is pretty long so feel free to skip to the bits you want to know about.

links:

Ofunato City Volunteer Center: http://ameblo.jp/ooshakyo/

Save Minami Soma Project: http://saveminamisoma.org/

It's Not Just Mud: http://itsnotjustmud.com/

World, How It Is.

http://www.youtube.com/worldhowitis

Twitter: @worldhowitis

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/worldhowitis

Touhoku Golden Week Panoramas

Ofunato City

Kesenuma City

Rikuzentakata

Rikuzentakata

[Japan, How it Is 08] Volunteering in Touhoku - Tsunami Cleanup

A look at Volunteering in the tsunami affected areas of Japan.
I went up to Ofunato City in Iwate Prefecture to volunteer.
It was my sixth trip up there. This video is more about the trip.
I will make a supplemental video with more info on how to go about volunteering next. If you have any specific questions, throw them in the comments below. I will try to answer them If I can.

Ofunato City Volunteer office (japanese):　http://ameblo.jp/ooshakyo/

絆

Frikkin’ Dinosaurs!

When we went to Tohoku in golden week. We took a trip up the coast (again for me) to Jodogahama. Repairs have come along a bit since last summer. They now have frikkin’ DINOSAURS!!!!!

No idea why though. It does suit the scenery i suppose. all we needed was some of THIS.

Shots #87 happiness

 

Golden Week Volunteering 2012: Part 2 –Revisiting Rikuzentakata

continued from here

After the first day’s work we took the first timers over to Rikuzentakata to get an idea of the level of devastation that the tsunami caused because in Ofunato, the amazing pace of the cleaning and reconstruction effort had hidden the scale of the damage. Things had not changed terribly much since I went in September, but for those who had not been back since last year golden week, they could see how much clearing had been done since…

Golden Week Volunteering 2012: Part 1 - Sanriku Ditches

I went back to Ofunato this golden week. This time however I was in a rather large company of ALTs who wanted to join me. There were two who had been before but all the rest were first timers.

3/11 Where were you? What have you done?

Last year the earth shook and the waves came in. While I don’t expect any of my readers outside Japan to have done anything (those of you who have contributed… Thank you.) Everyone who reads this blog and lives in Japan however.

Were you here on that day?

What did you think and feel?

And most importantly what have you done to help since then?

Ofunato HDR

What do you think?

Ofunato Volunteering - September 2011

We had a Friday public holiday last week in Japan which afforded me the chance to go back to Ofunato for a lightning volunteer trip with All Hands. I put the word out as I did before, but this time the call was answered by a fellow ALT in my city. We finished our work on Thursday, packed the loaner car I am currently driving (this is why) and headed north.

Ofunato Volunteers – Portraits

Thanks to everyone I met. Thanks for the great times. Thanks for the good hard work. The world needs more people like you.

 

If all goes well I'll be seeing you soon ;)

Ofunato Summer 2011 Volunteering – Water Closets and Free Candyfloss.

The Thursday and Friday saw me back with All Hands and onto a Job that taxed us both physically and mentally. We Had to remove 3 prefab bathrooms…

WITHOUT destroying the walls…

Ofunato Summer 2011– Chainsaws and FFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!!!!!!

Wednesday saw the re-opening of the City volunteer office and re joining them gave me a good chance to re-connect with some of the people I had met on my first trip in May…

Ofunato Summer 2011 Volunteering - Break Time

On Tuesday All Hands takes they day off. With the city volunteers still down for 1 more day it seemed like the perfect time to get that tourism that I had planned to get done done…

Ofunato Summer 2011 Volunteering - The SPPCF

After a good warm up on Sunday afternoon I was ready to go on Monday morning. I had chosen to go down to the marine factory site (A demolished refrigeration warehouse) to help The SPPCF – The Society for the Prevention of Prevention of Cruelty to Foam.

Ofunato Summer 2011 Volunteering. Getting started…eventually.

The next day (Sunday)I got up nice and early, got my shit wired and headed to the city volunteer center for my first day’s work…They were on holiday till that Wednesday. OH SHIT! I just spent 13 hours driving across North Eastern Japan to volunteer, only to find that I was going to waste a whole 3 days doing nothing. Needless to say I was displeased.

I decided to hit up the onsen and relax a bit and clear my thoughts. We had bathed there a few times on the previous trip but it was always at night and so I had never seen the surrounding landscape… Up winding road I drove, rounded a bend and it was like DAM!

Driving to Ofunato

I have been scarce again of late but as per usual I have good enough reasons. I just got back from my second time volunteering in Ofunato, Iwate Japan. The next few posts will cover that in depth…

On the 20th, I got up at a leisurely time and prepared everything I needed at a stately pace. It was hot and I didn’t want to stress. Headed off at a decent pace on the Kan-etsu expresway music pumping to match the pace of the fast lane. Hit the Takasaki junction and climbed onto the Kita-Kanto expressway  an even quicker dash across the smooth, sweet new tar that cuts across the bottom of Gunma and Tochigi. Things were going good onto the Touhoku expressway through the gentle curves up toward Utsunomiya and that’s about where it ended.

Kesenuma, Miyagi ~ On the way

Continued from here...

We headed back to Gunma on the Thursday Public holiday at the end of golden week. Since we were so close and the news flashes from there were so vivid, we decided to go back via Kesenuma.

Rikuzentakata, Iwate ~ Holy Shit!

continued from here…

Ofunato looked like a destroyed city. Rikuzentakata was wiped off the face of the Earth.

This was the real eye opener for me…

Ofunato, Iwate, Volunteering ~ The Shock.

continued from here:

Up until this point, the Tsunami damage I had seen was bad but it was not the worst. The evening news had shown me otherwise but I had not properly seen it from ground level. There were glimpses off in the distance. and it looked bad but it felt like it was not my concern. After all I had stuff to do, and to be honest, I felt good doing it…

We went on a disaster tour of Ofunato… The reality of the situation was rather more horrific than anything you can truly describe, or for that matter take pictures of. “Force of nature” was given a whole new bone chilling definition, just 1km down the road.