After a rough nights sleep of waking up to earthquake alarms, my eyes no longer felt heavy. Junko made some tea for me and Isa san, an older church member that also slept at their house. Being that the power was still out and we had no working stove, we kept ourselves entertained by keeping ourselves warm and listening to the news reports. We continued to feel a number of earthquakes, each of us questioning weather or not it would be another big one. When we got the morning newspaper, we were able to see for the first time many of the images of the communities and towns that are not too far from where we are. We continued to realize how blessed we were. Perhaps it was just me, but I could have never imagined seeing that amount of devastation compared to how intact everything is around here. The news had started reporting that they were finding hundreds of bodies here, and hundreds over there. We still couldn’t believe how fortunate we were to have a place to shelter us, and that we were all safe.
Later that morning, one of the Sunday school kids that live near by rode his bike to the church and wanted me to come outside and play with him. It was a beautiful day with the sun shining. I was torn on what to do. I really wanted to keep trying to somehow find Internet or a phone connection to better report my safety to friends and family, but alas, I gave up and played with Kazuki. A couple of friends named Chikara and Josh came out as well and we all played a round of bocci ball.
Later that day, we had our normal church staff meeting because we needed to prepare for out Sunday morning service. We did our normal Saturday cleaning but this time we changed the look of our sanctuary. In order to keep people warm in a cold sanctuary, we brought in a kerosene stove and had the pews horseshoed around our only source of heat. After we accomplished our normal clean up of the church, we stayed a bit longer to clean up the mess that Friday’s earthquake made of the libraries. In our small English library, both bookshelf’s had tipped over, making big piles of books that needed replacing. In the Japanese library, many books fell off the shelf. In our photocopy room, reams of paper had fallen off the shelf making a decent sized mess on the floor. As inconvenient as it was, it by no means compared to the devastation that had happened to many families. I couldn’t help forget how thankful I was to actually be sleeping and eating under a roof, in a bed.
We didn’t think that any children would show up for our weekly Saturday School, but three kids ended up coming, despite the constant earthquakes throughout the day. Along with the 3 children, there were many young adults that help out at the church to entertain them. Eight of us had a blast running around the church playing a Saturday School favorite, Capture the Flag. When 5:00 rolled around, the kids went home and I stood there and reflected on the day, I had so much fun. But a sense of guilt quickly filled its place. I felt terrible for forgetting about those thousands of people that were missing, and people looking for loved ones and people that no longer have a home. But again, I said a prayer of thanksgiving to God for protecting us and giving us so much.
Since it was around dinnertime, Chikara, Tomoari and I were invited to join the Sasaki’s for dinner. Junko had prepared a delicious spaghetti dinner. This time I was not only thankful for food, but also very thankful for being around people that treat me like one of their family and care about me.
After we ate our meal, we all thought that it would be safest to stay in large numbers. So Tomoari and I slept over at Chikara’s apartment. Before we settled in at Chikara’s for the night, we stopped by my apartment to grab some supplies and to stock up as much water as I could. I filled my bathtub and every pot and empty bottle I had, incase of our water being turned off. I also found my big hiking backpack and packed some clean underwear and socks, my ski clothes (the nights have been dipping below freezing), some extra clothes, non perishable food, my passport and anything else that I might need incase of another devastating earthquake. The other guys gave me a hand carrying my bedding up to Chikara’s apartment, and after we made our beds. Since we had all got such little sleep the night before, we quickly fell asleep.
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