Wednesday 16th March 2011
Not much to add today: we're still getting numerous aftershocks, some bigger than others. Shops are still hugely under stocked, but by doubling up our efforts to visit various places we're now OK for food and other essentials. Most shops and train services are closing a lot earlier than normal – Tokyo is not a 24-hour city at the moment. Rhiannon's school has been closed for another week. But this seems to be because other international schools have closed for two weeks and so many people have left Tokyo rather than any concrete reason (see the transcript at the end of this post for my reasons for thinking this).
I mentioned in my post yesterday that as I was writing, a large-ish quake jolted me. It turned out to be a 6.1 magnitude tremor centred on Shizuoka – a prefecture south of Tokyo, near Mount Fuji. Apparently – according to Twitter - 33 people were injured, 92 buildings damaged, 3 landslides, 500 homes still without water. And 21000 homes lost power but that was soon restored This quake was very worrying as Shizuoka is designated as the place where the doom-laden Tokai earthquake is overdue. Japanese geologists have long forecast a huge earthquake, called the Tokai Earthquake, along this zone. It hadn't happened yet. When people talk about "the big one" (ie earthquake) it's the Tokai they are referring to. Friday's magnitude 9.0 was not "it".
Social networking has been a lifeline – literally – for many people during these grim days. When all the telephone lines were down, including mobile phones, the internet was still working. Twitter has been buzzing, with approximately 1,000 tweets from Japan every minute in the early hours after the quake. Since then it has been an amazing way of communicating information around the world. Of course, misinformation has also been doing the global rounds, but it's quite easy to sort the wheat from the chaff.
Hashtags have been put to great use. My favourite being #Edano_Nero (nero means "go to sleep"). This refers to Yukio Edano, Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary and right-hand man to Prime Minister Naoto Kan who has been communicating every development since the catastrophes hit. He's been on TV almost constantly since Friday, to the extent that people started telling him to get some sleep. #Edano_Nero = Edano_go to sleep! He's been described as the 'Jack Bauer' of the crisis. He has commanded much respect here in Japan because he has explained the situation to people honestly and directly without reading from a script. Finally, he went to bed after working for 105 hours. Then people started using the hashtag # #kan_okiro … okiro means "wake up". Kan is of course, the Prime Minister who hasn't been seen much.
Facebook has been incredible too. My personal group of family and friends have been a huge source of comfort to me with their many messages and words of comfort and it's enabled me to update everyone on my situation with ease. Also, people have found friends and relatives displaced due to the earthquake via Facebook and the 6 degrees of separation theory really seems to hold water right now. News and information has been disseminated rapidly. Facebook even include this little box at the top of my Facebook page informing me of country-wide updates regarding the power-outages and other details.
News from the tsunami-wrecked north east has been very distressing. Due to the enormous death toll (at the time or writing, the number is over 4,000) the recovery teams have been told to photograph unidentified bodies and take DNA samples before disposing of them as soon as possible. Many thousands of people are still missing.
Finally, I just want to re-iterate my post from yesterday. We are staying in Tokyo unless we are told to go. The main danger is the aftershocks NOT radiation.
I now have the full transcript from the briefing meeting yesterday with The Government's Chief Scientific Officer Professor John Beddington, Hilary Walker from the Department of Health and Lesley Proctor from Health Protection Agency.
It's long, so get a cuppa and see why I am reassured!
