Nice to Have Some Help

Hirano san at Yamaguchi Temporary Housing.

The tanks and plumbing of Takata's temporary gas station.

After a few trips to Iwate by myself during the summer, I am getting some helpers lately. This time my wife came along to visit one of my first contacts, a Chinese lady whose requests for furniture got me started in the temporary housing projects. I had a number of orders, so I contacted Hirano-san, a young man who is part of an NPO that does a lot of mobile cafe/counselling work. I am glad he was able to come and lend a hand today (and tomrrow, too, thankfully).I first met him because he saw my decks while doing cafes, and wanted to learn how to make them. Now, he is good enough at it that he makes them himself. When we get together, we can really turn them out; a double and 5 singles today, despite the loss of about an hour while he tried to find me in Rikuzen Takata.
Usually I would have been fussing over the lost time, but this time I just took the opportunity to talk to the people at Japan's only (as far as I know) temporary gas station.
As their former location was near the 3 story Takata High School, their escape was harrowing (the school was completely innundated). The man I talked to said he figured he had time, so he stayed to finish up a few things before moving to higher ground.
"Hear that thumping? (a backhoe was packing dirt on a new road behind us, making an oddly metallic sound).
"Thats what it sounded like- the power poles being snapped off. That's when I knew I was in trouble. I jumped into my 4-wheel drive car and headed out. The wave actally caught me and lifted the car for a minute, but I got away. I have nightmares about it every night."
" I have 2 teenagers,. We live in temporary housing at the Sport's Dome. It's about one sixth the size of our house that was destroyed."
I asked him what he planned to do about housing long term.
"I don't know. I can't even imagine what I will do. I don't know if this job will last. I can't begin to plan. Everything is so uncertain."
And here I had been thinking this cheerful, upbeat crew were well on the way to recovery. Somehow they had managed to put together this jury-rigged, much-needed gas station on the twisting hill road which has become Takata's man artery. It seemed they were in the right place at the right time. The faciliy is temporary, but isn't it a step to a permanent one, a business with a future? Not so, apparently.
It's not over yet.