Matsukawa is slightly south of Fukushima City. It’s a beautiful area and it has lots of shrines dotting its countryside.

I went to Kuronuma Shrine.

It’s June, the rainy season. It was actually starting to rain a little when I arrived at Kuronuma Shrine.

Above……Kuronuma Shrine. It’s Shinto, not Buddhist.

potsuri potsuri potsuri…… drip drip drops of rain

Potsun… Solitude…

The Shi Shi guard the shrine.

The three hundred year old tree.

The tree and me

Forest….

The three hundred year old tree

path between the cedar trees

….potsuri potsuri….potsun….

On Facebook, I saw a post that a person named Lou had kindly put up. It’s about the Exclusion Zone in Fukushima Prefecture….how it has changed since the quake of 2011. (The Exclusion Zone–which I myself call the “Forbidden Zone”) is the area that residents were forced to evacuate after the quake due to the meltdowns at nearby Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.)

https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/ondemand/video/3016044/?fbclid=IwAR3_ZsvrzBi96dre8hVVkN7Sb162BZGi6UzrGF0sun6yT3Z6lCGewVdSmIk

Thanks, Lou. 🙂

The video is quite long, about forty minutes. If you are quite young, you may want to refrain from viewing it, or view it with a guardian. It’s rather sad.

Today this post is about sports. But first–

Nadeshiko is a Japanese word that refers to a kind of flower, a pretty pink flower called “Dianthus” in English.

A photo of the flower: from this site: https://jpninfo.com/27299/nadeshiko-flower

Furthermore, in Japan the term Nadeshiko also refers to the idea of a perfect traditional Japanese woman. You know what I’m talking about. Her is hair is jet black, her complexion is snowy white.  She’s shy, demure, feminine, dressed of course in a kimono. She eats fish and rice, never pizza and burgers. Her build is tiny, but her fingers are long and slender. She covers her mouth when she laughs. She’s, well, perfect.

So what does this have to do with sports?

And moreover, what does it have to do with Fukushima?

Can you guess?

NADESHIKO JAPAN is the name of the Japan Women’s Football Team (Football meaning SOCCER. Not Ame Fu, or as they say in every country except the United States, American football.)

So NADESHIKO JAPAN is Japan’s women’s soccer team. Currently they are playing in France for the Women’s World Cup of 2019.

So these this team of awesome soccer-playing women is called NADESHIKO JAPAN. What a great name! I’m guessing the players are not at all shy or demure, but they do represent ideal Japanese women!

Here’s an article about the team: https://taiken.co/single/samurai-soccer-the-story-of-japans-nadeshiko-heroes/

Okay, next. What does this team have to do with Fukushima?

Well, since 2016, their head coach has been Takakura Asako (TAKAKO-family name ASAKO-given name.) She is from Fukushima. Yay!

Here is an interview with Takakura.

https://tokyo2020.org/en/news/notice/20180830-02.html

Japan loves the women’s soccer team, NADESHIKO JAPAN. I’m always hearing about them in the news. Everybody is so proud of them!

This is also a very old post. I’m busy writing my manuscript. Also, with the rain, I’m not getting out much. Therefore, I’m delving into my unfinished drafts.

These are posters that were created with giving hope to Japan so that people here can persevere after the quake/tsunami/meltdowns.

(I received permission to take photos of the posters.)

How are you all today?

An earthquake struck here in Tohoku last Tuesday evening. Nobody was killed (thank goodness,) although some people were injured.

On Tuesday night I was in bed, and Pow! Wow! Shudder! Bang! The house shook with the tremors from a quake. It felt strong to me, so I thought, “Here we go again……!” (Thinking it was an Absolutely Huge Quake Which Destroys Half of Japan.)

So I hurried down our stairs, and said to Mr. Husband, “Where was it?”

He said, “Sakata!”

Well, that really shocked me. And scared me. Because that’s my husband’s hometown, and it is where his parents now live. And their cat.

WUZ SKARRRRRRY! YOWLD JUMPD ESCAPD! WURS THAN BIG DOG WIZ BIG TEEF!

Anyway, it turns out that my parents-in-law are completely fine. The cat is fine, too, but now wants to move to Australia.

In addition to Sakata City, the quake was heavily felt in Tsuruoka City (near Sakata) and in Niigata Prefecture.

Some people were injured, and some buildings were damaged.  Some of the jellyfish were killed (due to building damage) in the excellent aquarium in Tsuruoka.

There’s a nuclear power plant in Niigata Prefecture……….so of course, that was a worry. Fortunately, it was not harmed.

BUT!!!!!!!!!!!!

Somebody marked the wrong box in a fax about the condition of the plant in a form that must have looked something like this:

◊ Meltdown Imminent. Everybody Prepare To Die

◊ No problem here! Everything fine! 🙂

The person meant to tic the second box, but accidentally ticced the first box. (Or that’s what we are told anyway. Because I’m like yeah right. Likely story. Maybe the workers thought something was wrong, but nothing was? Maybe it was a passive aggresive Freudian slip sort of thing? I dunno.)

Anyhoo….here’s an article about the mistake:

http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201906200054.html

Over the past few years, I’ve taken photos, planning to turn them into posts–but I got busy and the posts never happened!

These pictures are several years old. Maybe 2016? My husband, son and I all went to Koriyama City (population-wise, the largest city in Fukushima Prefecture) for its Ramen Festival. It was raining heavily that day! It was a lot of fun, despite the inclement weather.

We took a bus to the park where the ramen festival was held.

Okay, Japan, you’ve rightfully earned your reputation as a Very Cute Country. Even your city busses are adorable.

This is the place!!!!!!!!! Is the weather going to show leniency upon us noodle slurpers?

Nope. No clemency from the Rain Devils.

(image used for free if recognition of site is given: https://www.irasutoya.com/ )

The flying carp tells us what time of the year it was. This would have been late April or very early May. (The carp are only flown at that time—like jack o`lanterns in October, and so on.)

“Men” means noodles in Japanese. (Any kind of noodle)

I’m guessing it means the same thing in the Chinese language because ramen (and noodles) originated in China. (In olden times, Japan borrowed A LOT–food, culture, language, etc.-from China.)

I just made this video near my home. It’s six-thirty a.m. Sunday morning, June 16.

Did you realize that next year the Summer Olympics will be held in Tokyo? Yes! The country is gearing up for it. It’s a little controversial here, though because some people feel that Japan is spending money on the Olympics, but hasn’t done enough to improve the conditions along the coast of Tohoku—people are still affected by the aftermath of the quake/tsunami. And also, there’s the nuclear plant situation in my own prefecture.

But anyway, before getting to the main part of this post, I’d like to tell you about the route of the torch. During every Olympics, a torch of fire is brought from Greece to the country hosting the games. Runners/walks carry it by hand along a route, handing it off to each other–this usually takes several months. At the very end of the relay, a famous person (usually an athlete from the host country) takes the torch on its very last leg and then lights the Olympic in the arena. That fire–from Greece–will burn throughout the duration of the Olympic Games. (About two weeks.)

https://tokyo2020.org/en/special/torch/olympic/schedule/

Above, I’ve posted a link to the schedule for the torch. First it comes from Greece, then it is on display in Ishinomaki City. Ishinomaki City was HEAVILY hit by the tsunami. It’s only there for one day. Too short! Can’t they extend the time it’s on display?

On March 24, it will also be on display super close to where I live–the east exit of Fukushima Station. Unless something happens, I’m sure I will go there and take a peek (and a photo.)

A couple days later, the relay of the torch will officially begin. No more cushy plane travel! No more fun locomotive rides! From now on, that torch will be hoofing it. The torch relay starts at J-Village in eastern Fukushima Prefecture AND THIS IS WHERE MY POST BEGINS.

J-Village was the training camp for the Japan national soccer league. So the J-Village was a Very Big Deal.

Unfortunately, J-Village straddled Hirono and Naraha, an area very close to the power plant which melted down. Thus, being in the Exclusion Zone, J-Village was unusable as a sports facility after the meltdowns occured.

Here’s a map of the areas with high radiation (Exclusion Zone) back in 2011. (from this link: https://www.pref.fukushima.lg.jp/site/portal-english/en03-08.html ).

It’s been eight years since the meltdowns and the levels of radiation have decreased during that time period. In some areas, the level has decreased to amounts that are considered safe. By “safe,” I mean the same level found in other parts of the world. thus, The powers-that-be are reopening areas of the Exclusion Zone.

(This is good news for the residents who DO want to return to their home.)

From that same link, here is the Exclusion Zone as of April, 2017:

You can see the boundaries of the Exclusion Zone have indeed changed from 2011 to 2017.

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So anyway, after the meltdowns in March of 2011, J-Village was (temporarily) transformed into a base for TEPCO (the Tokyo owner of the nuclear power plant.) Here is an article from 2011 about this: https://blogs.wsj.com/japanrealtime/2011/11/11/j-village-the-view-from-inside/ (Remember, this article is old!) Here a different article from 2014: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/japan/10829609/Fukushimas-nuclear-workers-base-to-reopen-as-2020-Olympics-training-facility.html

In recent years, the J-Village was cleaned up so that it could be used again for recreational purposes. Early this year, 2019 it was reopened to be used again as a sports facility. It is no longer in the Exclusion Zone, and that means anybody can go there. The radiation levels of J-Village are now considered (by the government) to be safe. I’ve posted links to a couple articles about the reopening of J-Village.

http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201904200045.html

https://english.kyodonews.net/news/2019/04/1c02bbf74a48-j-village-national-soccer-training-facility-fully-reopens.html

So anyway, the torch relay will begin at J-Village.

Is that area safe?

Well, I went to safecast.org https://blog.safecast.org/ to look at the current radiation in Hirono (home of J-Village.)

Here are the current results (morning of June 10, 2019)

Hirono (J-Village’s town has a radiation level of .13 or .11 microsieverts per hour. (I think that safecast uses two different radiation detectors in the same location. That’s why there are two different results.)

Here is Tomioka Town’s reading (a little north of the J-Village, and closer to Daiichi Nuclear Power plant): .33 or .38 microsieverts per hour.

In comparison—-

I picked a location outside of Japan at random— Honolulu, Hawaii has .09 microsieverts per hour. You can look at other places on the Safecast map.

From Canada’s nuclear safety guidelines http://www.nuclearsafety.gc.ca/eng/resources/fact-sheets/natural-background-radiation.cfm :

“The total worldwide average effective dose from natural radiation is approximately 2.4 millisieverts per year; in Canada, it is 1.8 millisieverts per year.”

I’m changing that to the equivalent in microsieverts per hour, so it will mesh with all the other numbers I’ve given in this post:  “The total worldwide average effective dose from natural radiation is approximately .273 microsieverts per hour; in Canada, it is .205 microsieverts per hour.”

So based on those numbers from Canada, the J-Village seems safe to me. I’m just looking at the numbers, though, strictly from a mathematical point of view.

The exact moment the Big Quake struck, I myself was lazing on our sofa reading “Kindred” by Octavia Butler on the Kindle my husband had given to me the previous the Christmas. In hindsight, I am really happy I was home at that moment. (Since it meant that I could immediately run to my son’s elementary school and check to make sure the kids were okay. They were, at least physically.)

But what was the prime minister of Japan doing that afternoon?

First of all, it was a different prime minister than the one Japan has now (Prime Minister Abe–2019.) In 2011, it was Prime Minister Kan.

Prime Minister Kan was in a Diet Meeting in Tokyo.

Cameras were on (filming the meeting) and it was caught on video. Keep in mind that this is Tokyo. And the actual epicenter was closer to the Sendai City area.  (The epicenter was in the ocean floor which is the reason there was such a huge tsunami.) Sendai City is far north of Tokyo, about two hours away…on bullet train! It’s a several hour car ride from Tokyo to the Sendai area. So you can imagine how much worse the shaking worse for people in the Sendai City area. The city in which I live is north of Tokyo, and Sendai City is north of ME!

There is a warning at the beginning of the video…but I think the video is okay for older (mature) kids. It shows shaking, but does not show tsunami or fire. Everybody is very confused, but nobody appears to get physcially hurt.

At the beginning, immediately after the woman runs to the fountain with her camera, the video switches to Prime Minister Kan. He’s sitting in a chair, apparently waiting, looking at the chandelier.

To be honest, that’s pretty normal behavior for all of us in Japan. Anybody who lives here in Japan experiences quakes. They are part of life. When a quake happens, what most people do (me, too) is just sort of wait—because the quake (until this one!) always goes away after a few seconds. A man like Kan (or any Japanese person his age) has probably experienced hundreds, possibly thousands, of quakes–none of which were dangerous.

Also, because he’s in Tokyo, I doubt he’s feeling it as hard as what I felt. The 3/11 quake was very, very long–it crescendoed. You can see in the video that–instead of dissipating–the shaking increases and the people in the room realize it’s stronger than a regular quake, not the normal kind that everybody has felt many times during their lives.

It appears to me that slightly after the one minute mark is when everybody in the room realize it’s a very serious, dangerous quake.

The video stops in mid-quake at exactly 1:25, then continues after the quake is over. Obviously it’s been editted. I guess maybe people in the room were embarrassed that they acted like wusses, so that part was cut out? I don’t know. I acted like a wuss, too. Not embarrassed to say that.

Then I don’t know…more shaking or something? An aftershock? I don’t know. Or maybe it was the camera shaking. LOL. Because of the break in footage, it’s hard for me to know the timeline.

Prime Minister Kan leaves the room. The video ends.

A word of warning. Do NOT go looking for footage yourself on youtube. Youtube is NOT a child-friendly place, and you don’t want to see things that really you (or I) should not see………

Last April (2019) I was walking here in Fukushima City’s BentenYama (a wooded area) and I saw a kamoshika. I posted about it on this blog because it was so unusual to see one there.

Then I went to the U.S. to attend my niece’s wedding in May. At that time, my husband told me the news was that a bear was spotted on Bentenyama! https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=ja&u=https://www.fnn.jp/posts/00073403FTV&prev=search (The original article is in Japanese, but I hit the “translate” button so English readers can understand it.)

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And now, in the Aizuwakamatsu area (in Fukushima Prefecture, but west of me,) a fifteen-year-old American girl was bitten by a bear. But don’t worry! It’s a “light injury” (news reports says: karui kega) and she’ll be fine. Thank goodness! Bears DO LIVE here in Tohoku. So don’t think they don’t!!!!! Spring is supposed to be the most dangerous time. The bears have just woken from hibernation, they’re grumpy and hungry.

Here’s an article about the bear biting in Japanese:

http://www.news24.jp/nnn/news162132613.html

The following article is meant to be read in Japanese, but I hit the “translate” button and the computer translated it to English. (I did this so English readers can read it.) https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=ja&u=https://www.fnn.jp/posts/2019060700000004FTV&prev=search

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I just searched for an English version of this news on both Google Japan and American Yahoo, and can’t find one. I’m sure there will be one soon.