Global IssuesJAPAN: Foreigners Show Solidarity Amidst Tragedy
When the massive 9.0 magnitude quake and tidal waves hit their little coastal village on March 11, Mariline Shoji and her husband lost everything they owned.
'I could hear the roar of the huge tsunami in the distance when I escaped to higher ground,' said Shoji, a Filipino who has lived more than 30 years in the scenic Gamo area in Miyagi prefecture some 300 kilometres north of Tokyo.
'When my husband and I returned the next day our house and all our belongings had been washed away,' she recalled.
Shoji, who works at the local government office as a consultant to foreign residents, told IPS she and her husband have sought refuge among friends, and have not given up. Their son is now married and living separately.
'I have no intention of returning to the Philippines. Instead we will soon rebuild in a new location, but definitely away from the ocean this time,' said Shoji, who was buying curtains for her renovated home when the tragedy happened.
The story of the Filipina wife is similar to several other experiences of foreigners who decided not to leave devastated areas. Among them is Akter Hossain, a Bangladeshi who has opened his hotel, the Asian Garden, to more than 400 residents fleeing radiation contamination from the damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant.
'There are currently 30 evacuees who can reside in my hotel free of charge. This is the least I can do to return the large amounts of Japanese aid we receive in Bangladesh when natural disaster hit us,' Hossain said.
Such stories have become symbols of solidarity in Japan, where foreigners have always lived on the sidelines.
Japanese media hailed the work of Rita Retnaningtyas, an Indonesian nurse, who continued to care for patients at the damaged local hospital where she worked as a trainee nurse.
'I admire her strength to continue working with the other Japanese staff when there was so much chaos at that time. As a foreigner who has never experienced earthquakes and tsunami, she displayed an admirable commitment,' said Wataru Fujiwara, spokesperson for the Miyagi National Hospital.
Miyagi prefecture is one of the worst hit areas, with more than 15,000 missing or dead reported there in the latest official data.
According to local government statistics, foreigners living in Tohoku, the site of Japan’s worst post-war natural disaster, are mostly foreign students, migrant labour or foreign wives.
Official numbers are not available, but the majority are Chinese, followed by South Koreans, Filipinos and Thais. Many are employed in small and medium companies that dot the region and are involved in manufacturing, fisheries or agriculture.
The exodus of foreigners, soon after the disaster, became a touchy issue. Yuko Tanaka, director of the Multilingual Hotline Centre, explained that the situation for foreigners was not easy after the earthquake, when they had to make difficult decisions whether to leave or stay.
'Radiation contamination from the damaged nuclear plant led to foreign governments urging their nationals to leave Japan.' Tanaka said. 'This meant, they had to give up jobs and some of them even their families if they were married to Japanese.'
Musatoshi Tateno, in charge of the Centre’s foreign trainee section, says the quake has raised important issues in migrant labour policies.
'When foreign workers returned to their countries, the loss was felt by Japanese companies and themselves. The workers need the income made here to send back home but had to leave because stringent local rules do not allow them to change jobs to areas that were safe,' he pointed out.
The Association for Small and Medium sized companies representing fisheries and manufacturing businesses in the Tohoku area that are dependent on foreign labour also reported the loss of workers who left for their countries.
One month after the tragedy, however, there are signs that these foreign workers are returning to Japan. The Multilingual Hot Line Centre, a service for foreign residents launched by local governments, is helping them make the difficult transition back.
'We offer support services to foreigners whose lives have been disrupted since the quake and also those who want to return. Their most pressing questions are trying to find new jobs and rent places again,' Tanaka said.
Father Charles Bolduc, head of the Motodera Catholic Church in Sendai City, provides counselling and support to foreigners affected by the disaster.
'The terrible catastrophe has actually shown how foreigners and Japanese are helping each other,' he said. 'News of foreigners departing has not dimmed the huge outpouring of solidarity across nationalities. This is the real lesson of hope from the disaster.'
© Inter Press Service (2011) — All Rights ReservedOriginal source: Inter Press Service