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While I am OK, have food and water and electricity at home....today at work, with my coworkers and the lights out, seeing most of them looking sad and serious and sallow...I caved into a wave of sadness. I don't even know if sadness is strong enough to cover it.
I think it is just the 4 days crashing on me all at once - but I was surprised that it happened then, in the relative serenity of the place. Maybe I have just been shocked and scared until now. We had aftershocks, but no one even batted an eye about them today. One knocked my purse on the floor. I just left it there. It didn't even register that I should pick it up.
One of the people I am closest to at work, told me in the most heart wrenchingly blank way about how they haven't heard from her brother, who was at work in Sendai, 50 minutes commute from us, since the tsunami. What do you say to that?
We are fortunate that we are in Yamagata, which was shaken but spared. But we are sandwiched between Miyagi (where the tsunami hit) and Fukushima (where the reactor is looming). People have been really neighborly and kind. We are all walking instead of driving because the gas is gone. Food and gas have always come to our rural place through the port in Sendai, which is now...not operable. But, we are the bread basket/rice cooker of Japan. We won't starve. People are dazed but really kind to one another. Everything is polite. Contained. Civil. No outbursts, even with plenty of justification, as most here have family working next door in places swept away.
And as everyone is doing such an amazing job of keeping it together, and calm.... me, the foreigner, the one with the fewest stakes here...I am the one who was overcome with sadness. I felt so selfish. I felt so heavy. I laid my head on the desk, and blanked out for a while. No one noticed. Everyone was doing their work, but the lights were out on just about everyone mentally.
I must have stared out the window for the better part of an hour. A friend came over and didn't even acknowledge that I was in such a weird position. She just told me that she was hungry, half smiled and made a cup of tea. When I offered her some of the tangerines I brought, she declined and told me it would make her sick to her stomach. She told me at least all this stress was good for her diet - she'd lost 3kg since Friday (if she even weighs 55kg, I will be shocked).
Odd that all over the world, even in dark times...women are concerned about their weight.
When she left, I went to the bathroom and sat, and cried. And, it didn't make me feel better. I was chastising myself for my weakness. My immaturity. The pointlessness of tears. The selfishness of feeling this way when everyone else has it worse than me. But my body wouldn't listen. Those places swept to sea in minutes? I've been there. My mom was planning to visit next month...and where would I have taken her? Sendai, Matsushima, and the beach. Hell, I was supposed to go to a hotel there on the beach this coming weekend. The hotel...its just gone.
But as I bawled like an idiot, it wasn't even all a coulda-been-me sorrow. I am just so sad about everything. And, I was ashamed because I'm probably the only one crying. Japanese people do not express themselves this way...they are pragmatic. They are law abiding and responsible. Respectful. And they hold "gamon" (perseverance/endurance/getting through whatever) as the highest virtue.
When I came to Japan 5 years ago, I hated that I always heard "Shogunai" - "It can't be helped" accompanied by a shrug which exonerated whatever the problem was. And complete acceptance that it was just not solvable by any means but gamon. Can't get package mailed today? Shogunai. Girlfriend pregnant and going to have a shotgun (or here "double blessing") wedding? Shogunai. Can't get the AC to work? Shogunai. Husband found in bed with a 19 year old? Shogunai.
The American in me was so mad about the helplessness...the passiveness. I wanted to know what the opposite of Shogunai was in Japanese. There isn't that concept in the language. I was excited when Obama was elected because his slogan made it into every classroom here. On T-shirts and TV, I heard it 50 times a day, and I was so happy that FINALLY the opposite of Shogunai was expressible and understandable here.
But now, in the wake of all this...I admire the ability of people here to embrace the reality of their situation with Shogunai. No one is going postal. No rallies. No one on a roof with a shotgun. No looting. Just gamon, everywhere. And as I sat in the bathroom, crying like a baby, I realized that it is fundamental aspect to the Japanese character, and that I was wrong when I thought I knew the best way was the way we did it back home. The only way. I was an ass.
I've experienced the disaster of hurricanes and aftermath...and that played out completely differently. Here, communities are quietly providing and pooling and helping. There is no me first attitude. For example, I was in a grocery line outside a store. People who were from Sendai, evacuated to our city, were encouraged to skip the line and go right in. It was a tiny sign. No one was checking driver's licenses....and no one was angry...and no one was abusing it. Not even a flash of annoyance as some families went ahead while we were in the winter weather for an hour. I didn't feel it either. It was a very different experience than I had back home, where there were signs that said "looters will be shot" every few hundred feet.
I am not saying that Japan is better than America - I think they both have great points and problems, I get as homesick as the next gaijin. I'm just saying that my perceptions are changing, and now I know there are deeeeep, fundamental differences in how people see themselves, their community, and their country. And how little anger, religious fervor (people here believe your beliefs are your private business and don't discuss them, and don't discount any) and me-first mentality there is. Even in the scare of nuclear meltdown, a 30 foot tsunami, still aftershocks and a predicted 7 on the horizon, and avalanches cutting off roads to the west...Japanese people are still showing their dignity.
They are quietly holding together, secure in the knowledge that their neighborhood, prefecture, state and nation have their backs. When the reactors had problems, they immediately destroyed them with sea water to prevent hurting anyone. There was no hemming and hawing about other methods, about trying to save the money invested into such a facility. They immediately went with the option that was devastating to bottom line but going to work. I respect that.
But I still feel conflicted about whether I respect myself, bawling in the bathroom. I gave into sorrow. Grief. And I am Ok. My family is not missing...not in danger. Why am I allowed to cry? It is snowing again and night has fallen. Thousands of people are huddled around fires, homes destroyed, less than hour by car away... and they are not whining and complaining. They are putting one foot in front of the other, confident that they will make it work, somehow, as a group...and they are right. And I sit and cry? Feel sorry for myself? Feel sorry for people with stronger character than me? How dare I?
=( I came home in silence. I stared into space some more...and then I grabbed a bottle from our ration stash of milk tea and drank half of it. It is kinda horribly vain of me to worry about my *diet*...but I am seeing the process, the mechanism the same as it always is for me. I gave into sadness, and I reached for carbohydrates. This milk tea isn't healthy tea with a splash of milk. No... this is a sugary drink made by a company bought by Coke. I banned myself from it months ago. It has High fructose corn syrup and 200 calories per 500ml. And, I used it as binge tonight. And it didn't make me feel better, but I systematically drank the rest of the bottle (if I had been full, I would have taken it all) I know it could be worse, and there are bigger problems afoot....again, I am ashamed that I am writing all this and that I even care. But, I got sad and I binged. I would have taken more if I was sure that it wouldn't hurt our shared rations.
We only have that stuff in the house because the stores were out of bottled water.
And now, I've broken and taken in that crap, and will have to try to wean myself off the sugar again tomorrow. I just hope that I am stronger and can do it then. Taking control of something this small and silly makes me feel less helpless in the world at large, I think.
I am writing all this to remind myself later - this was a horrible time. And, while you stumble, you are doing the best that you can. Don't give up. Don't give into despair - its not fair to anyone else. The coming weeks promise to be even harder. Do not wallow. There will be funerals to work though. Problems to be solved. You have to keep your head. No sniveling and feeling helpless. You are able bodied, and have resources. Make yourself a good neighbor to the kind people who've been honestly worried about you and checking in on the local foreigner. Play your unique part as someone who is different - smile, do the nicely unexpected - make people laugh. Be especially kind to the kids when they run up and practice random English. You do not have the right to fall apart. Especially not now. Chin up. Please.
Diet Calendar Entries for 14 March 2011:
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1797 kcal
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Fat: 112.59g | Prot: 53.16g | Carb: 166.81g.
Breakfast: eggs. Lunch: cashews, Almonds, walnuts, avocados, apple, banana, tangerine. Dinner: broccoli, carrot, tomato, banana. Snacks/Other: milk tea. more...
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3292 kcal
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Activities & Exercise:
Desk Work - 9 hours, Resting - 7 hours, Sleeping - 8 hours. more...
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