Extract from Le Figaro. Its reporting is an order of magnitude better than anything I’ve read in the local press, and Google translate just isn’t up to it. Sharing it might be my little personal debriefing strategy.

Disaster Victims Try to Survive 15/3/2011

In the northern regions devastated by the earthquake and tsunami, help has not yet arrived.

All is desolation on the main road of Tagajo, a hamlet wedged between the Pacific Ocean and the city of Sendai (northern Japan). The cars in the street, still muddy despite the army’s work clearing it, line it with battered shells, as if chewed up then spat out by a giant crusher.

Suddenly, on the radio, newscasters who announce nothing but disaster news since last Friday, reach a new level of seriousness: “To all the people close to the coast of Iwate prefecture, Fukushima or Miyagi: a tsunami is coming! Leave your car immediately and look for safety as high as possible.” All around, people rush to take refuge on the roofs of buildings. Soldiersof the Self-Defense Forces, the Japanese army, lead a small group of residents attempting to climb the highway suspended over a devastated landscape. “More than fifteen minutes,” warns a soldier. “We’re safe here, this is 8 metres high,” says another in a peremptory tone. “On the radio, they talk about a wave of 13 metres,” says a civilian, invalidating the soldier’s assurances.

“The government will not help us”

From their balcony, the locals scan the horizon. A soldier finally throws his arms in the air: “False alarm!” Life goes on, despite the mud, continuous tremors, nuclear threat and the tsunami. “We’re only missing a volcano,” jokes one resident, fatalistic. On Sunday, the authorities announce that the Shinmoedak volcano projects rocks and ash into the air up to 4000 metres “in Kyushu, southern Japan. The population no longer has the heart to joke. Faced with this offensive of nature, the Japanese have realised that they can only count on themselves, the authorities are clearly overwhelmed. They’ve organised themselves into neighbourhood communities, displaying an impressive solidarity. No risk of looting in Japan during shortages.

A few kilometres down the road from Tagajo, the inhabitants of Shiogama, streets flooded, have seen no police, nor ambulances, nor fire brigade, nor even journalists to record their grievances. “We have no electricity, no water, no telephone and are almost out of rice, and nobody comes,” said Emiko Ito, fishmonger at the local market. The people of his residence share what remains to them in the parking shelter, on a concrete block turned into a stall. Further up, the primary school gym has been transformed into a refuge for hundreds of homeless people whose houses were flattened by the earthquake and tsunami. Overhanging the sea, the building is theoretically protected from the rising waters.

“My dog has food for ten days, but I have nothing for myself tonight,” says a young native of Chiba, hugging his dog Anjie. “We don’t have enough for dinner,” confirms Noriko Sato, a teacher become by force of circumstances the leader of this community. “I convinced the people here to share everything, but it wasn’t easy. Anyway, we have no choice. The government will not help us. Look at them: they never decide anything. Then we, we decide! ” she rants.

Those in her care feel happy to be alive. “When the earthquake happened, I ran out of my shop, but the shock was so violent that I collapsed. Then I heard that the tsunami was coming and I had to climb to where I could. I took refuge on the roof of a temple, and I escaped the worst. I heard the roar of the waves for an hour, ” said Asako Saito, Kayoko his mother at his side. Outside, dozens of people wait patiently in front of a wall, waiting for a tanker loaded with water that does not come.