Monday 26 May 2008

Eye of the Storm

Q. What is the worst weather you have seen ?

I never forget the heavy rain of the summer 2006 which made big damage around Suwa area. Many persons died. Also some rivers flooded and the traffic network were paralyzed. The quantity of water of Togawa-rever, which is near my home, was unusual.

During heavy rain, I helped with fire brigade of my town to make many sandbags that is called “Dono”. After the storm, my wife and I participated to help the dredging to the channels for recovery.

I strongly understood that it is important to help each other and to connect with community.

Masanori Yagasaki

3 comments:

  1. Hey, I remember that storm Masanori!
    It seemed to keep raining forever?!

    I think a lot of damage was in Suwa/Okaya/Shiojiri, wasn't it? Good season for ducks!

    The funniest thing I ever saw was a fridge (yes, a whole electrical fridge) floating towards Niigata in the Metoba River in Matsumoto after a typhoon about seven years ago. The strangest thing was, I was actually looking for a second-hand fridge for our new teacher's apartment...

    I couldn't catch it!

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  3. When I read this book, I remember American movies "The perfect storm" and "twister". These movies helped me to imagine the situation of this story very much. Now, I'll answer the same question.

    When I lived in Tokyo, I experienced a heavy snow.
    I lived in our company's dormitory in Nakano where is about 5km from
    Shinjuku.
    One day of January, 1998, I had a conference with our partner at "NS
    building" in Shinjuku. It was cold day, but it was not snow on the morning.
    It takes about 5 minutes from Nakano station to Shinjuku station by rapid
    train.
    Then, we started the conference. There was no window at the conference room.
    After the conference, about 18:00, we moved to a Japanese IZAKAYA on the top
    floor in the same building. At that time, we could see falling snow from the window. However, we didn't know a amount of snowfall because it was dark and we could not see the ground from our table.
    We went out of the building after dinner, about 21:00.
    We were very surprised because all of things we could see were all white!
    Snow fell about 20cm deep. You may feel it's not so much but it becomes serious problem in Tokyo.
    Anyway, we walked through an underground passage to Shinjuku station.
    As we were aware, the Chuo-Line was snowbound. We heard a local line was working from Okubo station (the next Shinjuku station) to Mitaka station.
    We decided to go to Okubo station on foot. In tokyo, the distance between stations is not so far. About 20 minutes after, we arrived at Okubo station and we could get on a local train. Nakano is the 2nd station from Okubo. So, I thought I can arrive at my dormitory soon.
    After one hour, I was still in the train. The train run little and stop soon, run again and stop. There were a lot of passenger in the train and I couldn't move even a little. It was very terrible train.
    Finally, I could get to my dormitory at 0:30.
    If I knew the fact, I would go back to my dormitory on foot from NS building.
    I'm certain that I could arrive at my dormitory within one hour.

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