Dodging Swallows

It’s been five days so far in the boat shop, and although I haven’t personally done any serious woodworking, I’ve gotten good at sweeping the dirt floor, deciphering the boatbuilders thick Iwate accent, observing, and dodging the barn swallows that dive in and out of the workshop throughout the day.

I came to this project with few expectations regarding how much I would actually get to touch the boat. After all, I am the deshi no deshi (the apprentice’s apprentice). I mostly take notes and photos, and help translate when topics diverge from the technicalities of boatbuilding.

Murakami-san working on the boat, with me observing. Photo credit: Douglas Brooks.

It’s been incredible getting to spend time in the builder’s workshop and neighborhood. Two sides of the shop look out onto rice paddies, so I get to watch spring arrive one row of rice at a time. Today red tractors crawled through the deep mud, dropping bright green blades of grass into the soil. The little rice plants finally arrived at their destination, after being zipped around the windy roads of Tohoku with the wind in their hair, like wide-eyed children on the back of a pickup.

Rice field in spring.

During break time, his wife always serves us green tea and snacks. We have been served mochi balls seasoned with the leaves of a wild plant (yomogi), snails caught in the nearby harbor, and today conbu  (kelp), which had washed up on the shore. I can imagine all of the American localvores drooling at the site of their lifestyle. But for them, it’s not a political movement or a conscious effort to push back against modern consumerism, it’s just how they’ve always lived. 

Murakami Toshiko cleaning konbu. Photo credit: Douglas Brooks.

Two barn swallows share a nest in the workshop, and there are three former nests built on the sides of ceiling timbers. They fly in and out throughout the day, surprising visitors, but not the boatbuilder, Murakami-san. He said he doesn’t do fire-bending (yakimage) in his workshop because he doesn’t want to smoke out the swallows. Although a sweet gesture, they still have to put up with the regular scream of the circular saw. They don't seem to mind though, and Murakami didn't get fussy today when he found swallow droppings on his sumitsubo (inkpot for making straight lines). Their liveliness and dramatic exits and entrances are enough to make them a welcome presence in the shop.

End of the day with Murakami-san chatting with a friend outside the workshop.

Volunteering in Tohoku

Hi everyone! 

For the next three weeks, I will be assisting the independent filmmaker, Linda Ohama, with a feature-length documentary, Tohoku no Shingetsu (A New Moon Over Tohoku): Stories from Ewate, Miyagi and Fukushima. We will be traveling to different towns along the coast and recording stories of the survivors. I am raising funds to help cover travel expenses, and also to donate to a Tohoku organization that needs support. Please watch this video and consider donating to my fundraiser! 

Thank you! 

-Ryden-chan

Tanohata, Japan

Greetings from a cafe in Sendai station. I left Tanohata yesterday, and I feel a little out of place now that I am back in modern Japan with all of its conveniences and expenses.

I have spent the past 3 ½ weeks in Tanohata, which is a relatively rural fishing and farming village in northeastern Japan. I was born there when my parents were teaching English at the local schools. My middle name “Ryden” which means “thunder and lightening” comes from a local shrine.

I visited the Ryden shrine on the day I arrived, and on the day that I left. There are two towering horse chestnut trees that stand in front of the shrine, and red torii gates line the walkway. According to local legend, there was a large forest fire many years ago that stopped right in front of the Ryden shrine. So Ryden is revered as a spirit that protects people from forest fires.

During my time in Tanohata, I stayed at the home of an amazing woman who I endearingly call “Bayan” which means grandma, and her wonderful husband, who I call “Jiyan,” or grandpa. They have a full house, with seven people in total (+ me made 8) all living under one roof. The household includes Jiyan and Bayan, their oldest daughter, her husband, their 3 year old son, Bayan’s niece and her 16 year old son. It’s an incredibly lively household, with lots of laughter, food, and movement. We were rarely all gathered at once, with people coming in and out of the house at all hours of the day.

Bayan & Jiyan’s lively home.

Everyone in the family has been especially busy ever since “3.11,” which is one of the terms they use to refer to the great earthquake and tsunami that occurred on March 11, 2011. The tsunami washed away Jiyan’s large fish processing facility, which represented the majority of the family’s income, as well as Bayan’s smaller fish processing facility.

The overturned breakwater wall serves as evidence of the power of the 2011 tsunami.

While Jiyan was fortunate enough to be able rebuild his fish processing plant in a new location, there is still a lot of work that needs to get done before things can run smoothly. While I was there, Jiyan was working every day of the week, from the early morning until late at night. One of the challenges has been stabilizing the bacterial colony that processes fish waste. For the past month, he has had to tend to the bacteria every six hours, which included 6 in the morning, and 12 at night. I decided to join him and Bayan one evening, and hopped into his truck at 11:30 PM. When we arrived at the plant he said, “This is bad.” The car headlights illuminated an overflow of sand-colored steaming foam that was slowly crawling across the ground. It felt like a scene out of the sci-fi horror film The Blob. He jumped out the car, and starting sweeping the foam back into the underground tanks and adjusting knobs on the machines. Without rainboots, I couldn’t be of any use. Bayan and I slept in the car, and stepped outside once to look at the strange foam and gaze at the stars. We didn’t leave until 2:30 AM. Fortunately, Jiyan reassured me, that was the worst night. Most nights he was done within an hour.

While this demanding schedule put a lot of stress on them, there was at least one benefit: Bayan and I got to spend a lot of time together every evening sewing, doing yoga, and exchanging stories. She taught me how to sew a small handbag, or kinchaku, using silk cloth, and told me stories about the great tsunami of 1933 and 2011. I have always felt a special connection with her, and our one-on-one time together during this trip truly solidified our bond.

In addition to getting to reconnect with Bayan, I also got to visit with many old family friends. The first day I was in Tanohata, I volunteered at a ‘safe-driving campaign,’ where we handed out bags of goodies to drivers and politely requested their commitment to safe driving. While I was there, two older women looked at my name tag and then looked up at face. With a puzzled look they asked, “Are you possibly….Ryden!?” When I confirmed their suspicions, with big grins they recounted stories of holding me when I was a bald and chubby baby. It was touching to meet people who I didn’t even recognize, who were so excited to have held me as a baby, and to meet me as an adult.

A few weeks later, Bayan told me there was someone I had to meet, and she took me to their house. When we knocked on the door, an older woman answered, kneeling seiza-style on the floor. When Bayan told her who I was, the woman grabbed my hands, squeezed them, and with teary eyes told me about when she first met me as a baby. She held onto my hands for a long time, and pressed them into her cheek. I was so moved, I didn’t even know how to respond.

One last story I have to share: When my parents lived in Tanohata they were close friends with the village priest. He was an incredibly charismatic and vivacious character, who played the drum set and had a big smile. After I was born, my parents and the priest made a lighthearted pact that I would marry the priest’s son (who is only 3 years my senior) in the future. Although the agreement was made in jest, my parents do not hesitate to remind me of this pact. Since the priest was a dear friend of my parents, I made a visit to the temple.

The priest & I.

Sadly, the priest passed away seven years ago due to stomach cancer, but his son is now the priest. It was good being able to pay my respects to his father, and to connect with him as well. His son was initially a little confused as to why I was visiting, because he does not really remember my parents. I assured him that he and I had actually met before, when I was a newborn and he was three (I omitted the story about the agreement, which fortunately, I do not think he is aware of). He grabbed a pile of old family albums, and as he was flipping through the pages, I spotted a confused looking white face, and said, “that’s me!” Sure enough, it was a photo me in his father’s arms, with his son in the far right side of the shot. Once we discovered that photo, he really warmed up to me and we had a great time talking about his father and his own journey of becoming a Buddhist priest.

The priest’s son & I.

Now I am in Sendai, the Boston-sized city where I lived with my family for three years. For the next three weeks, I will be assisting the Canadian film maker, Linda Ohama, with a documentary about the resilience and hope of individuals in the tsunami-stricken coast, as well as Fukushima and the surrounding areas threatened by nuclear radiation. She has volunteered in Tohoku for the past year and a half, and as a filmmaker, she has been inspired to share the powerful stories of the people that she has met.

I will be raising funds in order to cover travel expenses associated with volunteering for this project as well as others, and would greatly appreciate your support. I will be sending a link to the fundraising site in the next few days, so please stay posted.

I had a lot of catching up to do in this entry, and I appreciate you taking the time to read it!

Sending my love,

Ryden-chan

Kesennuma, Japan

I have only been in Japan for a little over a week and a half, but I have to say it feels much more like a month. 

It’s hard to know where to start. So I guess I will tell the stories of these four photos, all of which were taken in Kesennuma, Miyagi, Japan.  

Murakami-san in his workshop.

#1: I went to Kesennuma this past week to meet one of the few wooden boat builders left in the region. I heard about him from Douglas Brooks, a Vermont-based boat builder who has apprenticed with five Japanese boat builders, and whose boat building class I took earlier this summer.

I have become really interested in traditional Japanese boat building and wood working over this past year, so getting to visit a boat builder’s workshop was a real privilege. I got to observe him at work and ask him lots of questions about different boat designs.

Since his workshop is on the outskirts of a remote village, I was generously escorted to the site by Iwabuchi san, the son of another renowned local boat builder. He took me in the family van, and on the road he showed me an NHK documentary about his father entitled, “The Last Boat Builder.” It was a touching film that had shots of him working on his boats, and even teaching elementary school students how to use traditional tools. Sadly his father passed away last year, and his workshop was destroyed by the tsunami. 

Boatbuilding nails found on the ground near Iwabuchi’s boatbuilding workshop.

#2: All that is left of his father’s workshop are rusted tools that were heavily corroded by the tsunami. Iwabuchi actually took me to the plot where his house once stood and showed me the tools that volunteers had carefully recovered and cleaned. He was eager to show me the custom-made nails that his father had once used, but couldn’t find any in storage. However after walking around, he realized that the nails had been strewn about the yard by the waves. He picked the nails up and handed them to me as gifts. I was very moved by this gesture. 

#3: Although a year and a half has passed since the shinsai, or ‘earthquake disaster’, the displacement and loss of people and their possessions is still incredibly real. In Kesennuma, they decided to leave an enormous tuna fishing boat right where the tsunami left it. Now it serves as a testament to the power of the tsunami and a memorial to the victims. It is a haunting site to witness, and many locals have fought for it to be removed, not wanting to be constantly reminded of the horrific event. While I was standing at the bottom of the ship, looking up from what used to be an underwater vantage point, I noticed a woman was unloading her groceries from a car nearby. I wondered what it must be like to try to continue life as usual, while living in the shadow of such an ominous structure. I hope that it has become part of the landscape, something that exists only in her peripheral vision. But I suspect that it is still front and center.

Hotel Boyo family.

#4: As I got to know the owners of Hotel Boyo, I started to realize some of the the long term effects the disaster. Although they run a relatively successful hotel, I soon learned that the family (husband, wife and grandmother) were all living in the hotel because their homes were washed away by the tsunami. The owner said that they are refugees in their own hotel. The majority of their guests are construction workers, volunteers and other people involved in recovery efforts. This was particularly apparent when I realized I was the only woman at breakfast, and everyone else was wearing work boots and tool belts.

It appeared that many people from Kesennuma are in a kind of limbo, not sure when or where they will resettle. However despite all of the loss, uncertainty, and trauma that people carry with them, there is also laughter and a sense of camaderie. The family generously invited me to have dinner with them, and that night four young volunteers also appeared and enjoyed the leftovers of the hotel guests. We all joked around and had a great night. As the owner said, this past year has been “a year of bonding.” After talking with him for hours about everything from his family’s survival story, to his U.S.-wide road trip in the 70s, it felt like we were old friends. 

Now that I’ve made it to Tanohata, I’m reconnecting with all sorts of really old friends - many of whom remember me from when I was a bald chubby baby. So that’s been wonderful as well.

Chubby baby chronicles to follow.

I hope you are all doing well. If you have the time, please send me an update about your life too.  

From Tokyo to Tohoku

I safely arrived in Tokyo three days ago, and am finally getting into the groove of things.

A worker slicing fresh tuna at Tsukiji fish market, Tokyo.

It’s been a little non-stop since I arrived. Bright and early on my first morning here, I went to Tsukiji, the world’s largest fish market. Workers were using huge band saws to cut through flash-frozen tuna, and sword-like knives to slice into fresh ones. Throughout the labyrinth of stalls there were also huge clams, octopi, and wide-eyed fish staring up at me as I tried not to get hit by numerous small trucks. It was amazing to see a world that seems relatively unchanged in such a modern city.

Later that day I jumped onto a bullet train, and flew on up to Sendai. I am currently couchsurfing with a wonderful Ukrainian couple. They both play traditional Japanese instruments, and this morning they treated me to a performance with a koto and a kokyu. It was absolutely beautiful. 

Tomorrow I will walk around my old elementary school and see if I can find some familiar nooks and crannies in the neighborhood. So far so good.

Hope you are all doing well.

-Ryden* chan

*Ryden is my middle name and it means God of Thunder. I was named after a shinto shrine in my hometown, Tanohata, where everyone calls me “Ryden chan” (aka ‘lil Thor’)!  

Hello, I’m Mr. Fox (Kitsune san) and I live in Edo, Japan. I’m following Angela’s travels and I hope you will too.