Hanshin victims renew vow to move on

The Yomiuri Shimbun

Choi Minbu, center, lights a candle at a park in Suma Ward, Kobe, early Tuesday.

KOBE--On the 17th anniversary of the Great Hanshin Earthquake on Tuesday at 5:46 a.m., Choi Minbu, 70, who runs a shoe factory in Suma Ward, Kobe, observed a moment of silence at a park near his house with his neighbors, an annual practice since the Hanshin disaster.

After breathing in cold air, he closed his eyes and emptied his mind. The face of his 20-year-old son, Sgan, who was killed in the quake, always comes to mind, he said, but this year he also thought of children in the village of Noda, Iwate Prefecture, hit hard by the Great East Japan Earthquake.

Choi was one of many people who gathered at the exact time of the Hanshin quake to remember those killed by the 1995 disaster, and also those affected by the events of March 11, renewing their determination to move forward.

Choi is a member of a Hanshin quake civic storytelling group called Kataribe Kobe 1995. Last summer, the group invited 28 fifth- and sixth-grade students from Noda Primary School to Kobe. The group took them to the zoo and held a bus tour of the city.

During their visit to Kobe, some of the children became silent because they witnessed the devastating tsunami of March 11 firsthand, according to Choi. In Noda, 37 villagers were killed in the disaster.

"Emotional scars usually don't go away easily. My emotional scars also haven't disappeared," Choi said, recalling the events of 17 years ago.

His son, a university student in Tokyo who had returned home at that time, was crushed to death when Choi's house collapsed in the Hanshin quake. Sgan was initially scheduled to return to Tokyo on Jan. 16, a day before the disaster, but Choi had persuaded him to stay longer in Kobe.

Choi has since blamed himself, saying, "It's like his father killed him."

Choi joined the Kataribe storytelling group in 2006, and has since visited primary and middle schools among other locations to speak about his experiences of the Kobe earthquake.

"When we went to a public bath together shortly before the disaster, [Sgan], who was quiet compared with his brothers told me he planned to become a teacher. I thought he was standing on his own feet, and I was happy," he said.

But despite working as a storyteller, Choi's grief has never abated.

Late last year, Choi visited the village of Noda, where debris from the Great East Japan Earthquake remains, and again met with the children. When he saw the debris, he remembered the children had been surprised to see new buildings in Kobe. He then realized it took Kobe 17 years to reach that point of reconstruction.

In Noda, he talked to local children about his own efforts to rebuild his factory that had collapsed in the 1995 disaster.

"Simply being healthy makes your parents and people around you happy. I want you to live your lives to their fullest," he said.

"From now on, I want to tell people about how we've been overcoming hardships [in Kobe]," Choi said. "Sad stories alone won't energize people."

Choi is also keen to attend a graduation ceremony at the school and speak about the meaning of life in March.

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'Light of Hope' from Kobe

Early Tuesday morning at Higashi Yuenchi park in Chuo Ward, Kobe, Gasho Hisano, a chief priest at Anyoin temple in disaster-stricken Iwaki City, Fukushima Prefecture, transferred a flame lit inside a 1995 Hanshin quake monument to a lantern.

Hisano will later walk about 800 kilometers to Iwaki City to personally "deliver" the flame and commemorate victims of the 2011 disaster.

In March, Hisano, 40, will transfer the flame at a Buddhist ceremony in Iwaki to mark the first anniversary of the Great East Japan Earthquake.

Anyoin is located about 50 kilometers from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant. Having seen firsthand people who have been forced to live in fear of harmful radiation, or separately from family members because they have moved to other prefectures, Hisano asked that the flame from Kobe, "Kibo no Akari" (Light of Hope), could be shared with him and other people in the disaster-stricken Tohoku region.

He hopes the flame will serve as a symbol of reconstruction.

At 5:46 a.m., the exact time the 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake occurred, Hisano prayed for the victims of both disasters before starting to walk with the lantern.

The lantern will reside at Mondo Yakujin Tokoji temple in Nishinomiya City, Hyogo Prefecture, until Feb. 5 before Hisano restarts the walk.

"The flame carries hope and the warmth associated with rehabilitation. I want to bring hope to disaster-stricken areas in eastern Japan," Hisano said.