Dispatch From Japan

At her family home in Japan, Itsuka Kimura is adapting to the new reality of life in a country torn apart by natural disaster.

Itsuka's account of her experience in Japan after the earthquake came to Patch because of her close ties to Edmonds. Itsuka and her family are close friends with the Peters family. The two households became acquainted in 1992 after Ryan Peters, then a student at Edmonds-Woodway, did a homestay with the Kimuras in Hekinan. Edmonds and Hekinan have been sister cities since 1988.

In the years following the homestay, the Peters hosted the Kimura family and their friends in Edmonds many times. Itsuka, the youngest daughter, took classes and earned a degree at Edmonds Community College.

Itsuka Kimura now lives in Tokyo to attend college, but her family remains in Hekinan. After Llynda Peters and I emailed Itsuka asking about her family, she sent us the following response:

Hi Heidi,

I read your email and Llynda's.

Now I'm back in Hekinan, and I'm with my family.  In Tokyo, we had small quakes even after 3 days of the big earthquake that happened on the 11th, so I decided to come back to Hekinan for now.

On the 11th when the big earthquake happened, I was at school in Ebisu.  Ebisu is one subway station away from Shibuya.  When it happended, I thought it was the
earthquake like we sometimes have, but it wasn't.  It was long and it got bigger and bigger.  We all evacuated outside, but I couldn't walk right because our school
building was shaking.  I saw some glass shelves in the classroom fell to the ground and they were broken.  And I saw a 7-floor shopping mall next to the Ebisu station was shaking so badly.  It didn't stop shaking for a while.

That day, almost all JR (Japan Railway) trains in Tokyo stopped running, so there were so many people around the station at night.

The next day, the 12th, my school was closed so I stayed at my apartment all day.  I felt small quakes many times.

On the 13th, I went to school in the afternoon, but we still had small quakes many times.  I went to the supermarket, and I saw some foods are in short supply.
In the morning on the 14th, we had a little big quake again, then I decided to come back to Hekinan.  The Shinkansen weren't running in the morning because of power
failure, but they started running in the afternoon so I could come home.

My mother told me on the 11th, the earthquake registered 3 in Aichi, and they didn't have any problems here. Last night around 10:30 PM, we had another earthquake.  It registered 3 here.  The news said the center of the earthquake was located in Shizuoka, between Tokyo and Aichi, and it registered 6 there.

Here in Hekinan, we don't have any problems and we can have our normal life.  What we can do is to save electricity.  The electricity in many places in Kanto area
(Tokyo, Tochigi, Ibaragi, Chiba, Saitama, Shizuoka, Gunma, Yamanashi, and Kanagawa Prefecture) is cut off intentionally, so I feel I shouldn't waste our power.

I'm sorry for my poor explanation. I'm not sure if this response will help you or not.  If you have any questions, I'll be happy to answer for you!!
:)

Itsuka

Note: The City of Edmonds asks people wishing to donate to rescue and recovery efforts to go to the web site www.seattlejapanrelief.org. The site was created by Japanese organizations in the Puget Sound area and is supported by the Sister City Commission.