Alexandra Rounds
April 11, 2011
Professor Hammond
English 101
Reawaking from disasters

Natural disasters have destroyed lives and treasured possessions, but it is the way a people respond to the natural disasters that defines them and identifies them as a culture. Japan was hit by one of the largest earthquakes ever recorded on March 11. The magnitude-9.0 quake spawned a deadly tsunami that slammed into the small island nation, leaving a huge swath of devastation in its wake. Thousands of people are dead and many more are still missing or injured; almost half a million people are homeless. Numerous people and organizations rushed to their aid. Krista Mahr’s article “How Japan Will Reawaken” told of the suffering and anguish the people were feeling, but also depicted how they went out of their way to help one another. Anyone and everyone who was in need of help received it; even people who suffered and lost family or homes from these disasters went out of their way to help others.
Cultural conformity and unity are trademarks of the Japanese culture compared to American culture. Mahr’s words told the story of the Japanese people and how, even after the worst natural disaster, they can be caring and think about people within their community and helping others instead of themselves. There was another such disaster that affected the United States, Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans and the surrounding area. The response reported in the news was unlike the response in Japan. Reports of racial segregation and class subjugation regarding aid and shelter were prevalent. Racial and economic disunity hindered aid and relief work for many victims during and after Hurricane Katrina. According to Mahr, Japanese culture is not based on individual rights; it is based on the honor of the family and the honor of the group. The education system is uniform and every student learns the same material. From a young age the pressure to represent the family and to bring honor to the family is evident and very powerful. From their education grows an understanding that the Japanese people as a whole are a group or “one” and that when conformity is more important than notoriety. This cultural phenomenon is most evident during times of crisis. After the devastation a man returns to his home, not to search for keepsakes but for food to bring to people who escaped the quake and tsunami:
“His first priority was scooping up sodden rice to take back to his hungry family and neighbors, who had escaped the wave by scrambling to higher ground. Yet even as the fisherman packed the ruined grain into a sack, he displayed the fortitude and generosity that have so defined this devastated region of Japan. Haga was embarrassed that the rice was spoiled, but he invited me to take some. A neighbor had found a bottle of grain alcohol bobbing in a fetid pool. Would I like a fortifying gulp? The next day, Haga would join Akaushi's other survivors to begin the slow clearing and reconstruction of a village virtually wiped off the map. "We'll all try our best to do this together," he said, not a note of pity in his voice. "That's the Japanese way, isn't it?" (Mahr 1). The man’s actions express Japanese culture, how he helped people around him as he went to take food to his family. American culture is based on economic differences instead of a collective American culture. Because of the cultural and economical identification, the American dream is harder to achieve for minority groups. Tangled in American culture, poverty a key role that plagued aid and shelters for some people during and after Hurricane Katrina. “The largely lower income population of New Orleans bore a dis- proportionately heavy burden of pre-disaster chronic disease complicated by inadequate health care access” (Mills). Both cultures have some similarities when dealing with disasters. Both country’s communication between relief agencies was not coordinated; there was no communication with each other because they had no way to communicate. “There was total confusion because incoming information regarding this disaster exceeded their ability to manage communications” (Okumura 613). Chaos and miscommunication make it harder for relief to be supplied to the people in need, leaving a major hole in the search of people and reconstruction of lives that leads to the greater impact of the disaster. Soon after the tsunami and earthquake destroyed parts of Japan, people and relief groups sprang into action looking for anyone and everyone to lend a hand to or search for lost loved ones and valuables lost in the wreckage. Earthquakes and horrible natural disasters have prepared the people and relief organizations in Japan. If it was not for their preparedness, the earthquake and tsunami could have caused exponentially greater problems for Japan. Their crisis relief groups are also one of the best in the world, “Japanese Red Cross Society is one of the world’s most active societies, with sixty-thousand permanent staff and more than two million trained volunteers (Moszynski 1). The Japanese people in previous crisis situations invented “superambulances” (extra-large ambulances equipped with 8 beds) and large tents expandable with compressed air were set up (Moszynski 1). People are now going back to their homes, but there are over a thousand who cannot go home because their house was destroyed and washed away by the earthquake and tsunami or they live near or around the Fukushima power plant.
The Fukushima nuclear plant was constructed with earthquakes in mind, with Japan’s history and it would have been ok if the tsunami did not follow. “The tsunami that obliterated whole swaths of coastal infrastructure--apparently overwhelmed the plant, leading to the worst nuclear accident since the Chernobyl disaster in April 1986 (Raloff 1).” Workers have struggled to control and regulate the radiation, at first it was thought that the radiation would not spread past the plant, and people were warned to stay indoors. But as time went by people were evacuated, today there is a twenty-kilometer radius of evacuated homes around the plant. Although the devastation and impact of the health of people around will not be known for some time, the people who are the most affected are the brave people working inside the plant to try and stabilize the reactors. They are exposing themselves to extreme levels of ration, large enough amounts that are killing them as they work yet they remain because they are sacrificing themselves for the greater good. They do not see themselves, as individuals they see themselves as protecting their culture, conforming to the needs of the community are more important than their individuality. As the search continues, the stories of the people who have been rescued begin to rise out of the water. Hiromitsu Shinkawa was found by a rescue team ten miles out at sea floating on the roof of his house two days after the earthquake. He said he saw the wave impending his home that he and his wife made the terrifying journey back to their house to gather more belongings but soon after he was pulled out to sea by the monstrous currents (Dodd 1). After rescue teams pulled him off of his roof he told his “guardian angles” that his wife was still missing and he had no idea where she could be. Another survivor Yuko Abe told her story and tearfully told that she was still searching for the parents and older brother, and how she could not call her other family members to let them know that she is safe because the telephones still are not working (Dodd 1). She was found inside what was left of her home that had been destroyed by the tsunami, she waited in her home for ninety-two horrible hours uncertain if she would ever be found. When rescuers found her she was suffering from hypothermia but conscious (Dodd 1). Similar to the hurricane that devastated Japan, the horrific hurricane that destroyed New Orleans caused many people to loose their homes especially in the lower income neighborhoods. From the havoc came an even larger enemy “being poor in America, and especially being poor and black in a poor southern state, is still hazardous to your health.” (Mills). Poverty was a main brick wall people stranded and in need of help people faced, because of the horrible conditions and the thoughts for rebuilding were far in the future many people started to become sick. Without the hope for help in the future, “ hundreds of thou- sands of evacuees dislocated all over the country, Hurricane Katrina has set the stage for a public mental health crisis that may un- fold for years to come” (Mills). Combined with the flooding and pre-existing economic disadvantage, the African Americans were evacuated only to have their homes destroyed knowing that they would have enough money to rebuild. Due to their low income, the lower income families would not have a car accessible to them to find food and get a job. Leaving the lower income families stranded with no way of finding or going to the designated area to get food and medical aid. The Super Dome was expected to be a safe shelter for a few days during and after the horrible disaster. “Lacking cars, credit cards, or the several hundred dollars in ready cash necessary to stage any kind of evacuation from the city, many of them stayed behind because they had no other choice. As the water began to rise, many Iberville residents waded through the muck and then lived through the hellish aftermath in the Superdome” (Long 795). As people waited for the storm to pass in the Super Dome the roof began to peel off with the force of the wind, making the dome unsafe for evacuees to stay. “When they were finally rescued five days later, they were widely dispersed across the country in the chaotic evacuation that followed. The residents of public housing just like the city's other renters and homeowners also lost their homes and neighbor- hoods when the flimsy, federally underfinanced levee system collapsed (Long 796). The aftermath of the hurricane brought devastation and unknown to the lower income class. With no hope of aid and the supposed safety of the Super Dome destroyed the thought of hope and a new beginning was far from near. As people watch on the news, more horrific and terrible stories and pictures are released presenting the turmoil and devastation the earthquake and tsunami left behind. The death toll and statistic continue to rise even after the estimated toll, “as of March 21, eight thousand six hundred and forty-nine deaths had been confirmed, thirteen thousand two hundred and sixty-two people are officially missing, and two thousand six hundred and forty-four people are injured. The final death toll is expected to be above twenty thousand” (Moszynski 1). Yet with all that death and injury the Japanese people help each other, work together to find missing people and work tirelessly even when death is near. Why can Japan overcome the worst natural disasters in history and not have any gangs, or violence terrorizing people but when Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans, Americans faced further racism and economic barriers when trying to obtain medical aid and rescue? Maybe the rest of the world should stop and think about how their culture would act if the same catastrophe were to crash upon their shores? Would they act the same as the Japanese are?
v