Reiko-san lives in a village on the far side of the port, so that most of the town of Ofunato is obscured from view. She’s a friend of the American Buddhist nun Tenku Ruff, who asked that I pay a visit. As we drive the loop road it’s easy to see how the Wave entered the harbor, then pushed out, claw-like, in all directions, lapping up villages in a wide swath, almost a full circle.
Reiko-san is in temporary housing, though she can barely manage to care for herself. She is so bent over with osteoporosis, she appears to have no torso at all. When we find her, she’s perched on a bed—merely a head and legs. But her wide, sun-creased face is welcoming. She says that in eighty-six years, she’s never once left her village.
“I didn’t know my house had been washed away. They didn’t tell me. They took me to the evacuation center, making sure they didn’t pass my house so I wouldn’t see. By the time they told me, it had been torn down. I didn’t have a chance to get anything out of it. All I had was my handbag. My husband is in hospital. He’s not well, not remembering me, so there was no one to help. All I could do was put my palms together,” she says. She’s a member of the local Buddhist temple, and a monk named Yuji, from a town in the mountains, visits three times a week and helps care for her.
“I was lured here by my husband fifty years ago, after the war. We were the first generation to live in Ofunato. We had a big house and I raised our children there. Now, they are in their sixties and their houses were washed away too.
“I never imagined it would happen in my lifetime. I’m eighty-three. Or is it eighty-six? I can’t remember. There are signs in the village that show how high the water went in the previous tsunami. I remember it came in very slowly, but this time, the water came fast. It was a huge wave facing us. Some fishermen won’t go back out to the ocean. They get seasick; they’re too scared.
“The city provides lunch for me every day. My son is wealthy. He had a big statue of the Buddha. His house was at the highest point, way up on the hill, and even that was washed away! He tells my husband that our house is gone too, but he forgets and says, ‘I want to go home.’
“I don’t want to die before my husband but it’s hard, not being able to walk. My only wish is for him to die in peace; then I can go as well.” She begins crying. I take her hand in mine; Nikki takes the other. She wipes her tears, smiles a broad smile, and passes a box of manju—Japanese sweets.
“He was a hard worker. He harvested scallops and cared for us. He built our home. The hardest thing is to be separated from someone who is still here. Now we are poor. We have nothing. I really don’t want to live anymore. Really, the truth is, I would like to put an end to my life soon.”