"We are All OK Desu"

I'm not a person who enjoys crying, or sad movies, or cutting onions.

Which is why I've had such a hard time emotionally approaching the situation in Japan. The day after the earthquake and tsunami in Sendai, I awoke in the morning to the news of the destruction, and watching the video coverage was absolutely heart breaking. Having lived in the Tokyo area for a year and a half (Marcos was there for two years) serving a mission for our church, the Japanese people and country of Japan mean so much to us. As the death toll in Sendai has risen, and the video coverage expanded to include videography from people standing on site on high ground, and I have seen images of the bright healthy green of a beautiful countryside of rice paddies turned into brown wasteland, I have felt myself stepping backwards from the situation out of emotional self-preservation. It is just too close to home. We have sent money, and prayers, and have tried to do our piece, but I have felt so helpless in the face of such expansive destruction. This is the first natural disaster that has effected us on a personal level.

Fortunately, I have heard back from pretty much all of the families with whom we still keep in contact, and everyone is well and accounted for. We lived far enough away from Sendai that most of our friends felt the earthquake but were not in the areas that were so widely damaged. Today I received an email from Ueda San, a mother of a sweet family I was close to in Chiba-Inage. It is a reminder to me of how incredible the Japanese people are, how committed, how hopeful and how resilient.

Her email subject was, "We are All OK Desu".

Dear Metta,

Hello, I'm very sorry that haven't write you such a long time. How are you?

Our family, we are all ok. as you know, we had a really heavy earthquake two weeks ago. But we live in Chiba, it is center of Japan. we are all OK nobady hurt, though we felt heavy impact never done before. However people who live in Miyagi Iwate and Fukushima lost their family, yard , job or more very importnat things.

So I feel very sad to think about them. and more over Nuclear plants in Fukushima had broken by the earthquakes and tsunamis. people lives in Fukushima, near the plant need to take refuge from there. I live in Chiba it far from Fukushima, 200KM, but the air and the water polluted. even thougt it is very few, I anxious it. it was the worst natural disaster in thre history of Japan.

However it brought us time to concider.
How much we are happy with our family, How much we are happy to eat every day every time.
How much we are happy without any anxiety or concern.
How much we are happy we can use the water, light, gas when we want to use.
it is really tahnksful and great things.
we recgnize how much happy we are, again.

We Japanese and Japan come up really hard thing now. I really hope that the worst things will change for the better as soon as possible.

Well, Thank you for reading. talk to you soon.

Love
Yumiko