Earthquake Diary 31

Saturday, March 26
Yesterday I left my apartment a little after 7 a.m and walked to Izumi Chuo where I caught a bus that took me to the same little supermarket that my wife and I had been to on March 23. At that time they said that they would have pork on Friday, so I went there hoping to get some. I arrived just a little bit later than we had the previous time and found that I was the first person in line. Apparently there is more food and supplies around (four delivery trucks came and went while I waited for the 10 a.m. opening) so people are not in such a hurry to get into the stores.

When they opened, I went through the door first and headed straight for the meat section. Sure enough they had quite a bit of port and some beef, so I bought to large packages of thinly sliced pork, and two packets of peanuts. I then walked back toward home. On the way I deliberately passed Green Mart, an up-grade supermarket that we like, especially the bread store. They were selling things outdoors because the building itself was damaged. However, the bread store was selling loaves of bread, one to a customer, so I bought a loaf and a couple of packages of sausages.

Then I walked over to another bread store but that was still closed. Next, I walked back to Izumi Chuo, thinking that I might stop at Ito Yokado, but the line was fairly long, not like on other days, but long enough that I did not want to wait just to look.

From there I walked to a cake shop, one that we think is the best in Sendai, and bought some delicious looking cakes. I took them home and we ate them immediately. In the afternoon, I just hung around, watching TV between times on my computer and washing dishes.

One of the things that became vary clear from this walk of 10 kilometers was that things are rapidly getting back to normal, or at least as near normal as they will be for a long while. Most of the damaged buildings had crews working on them. Although there were still long gas lines, there seemed to be more gas. Most stores were either open or had people inside working to get them ready to reopen.

The gas company has brought in people from all of the country to speed up the process of inspecting each house and then restarting the gas. According to the newspaper they have managed to reopen all the major roads and most of the minor ones. The trains will take longer because of severe damage in some places, but they are reestablishing service as soon as a section is safe. The Shinkansen and our subway will take another month.

I have heard from a fellow teacher that the building that holds the part time teachers lounge at a university I worked at until March 2010 has been condemned. The building holds the faculty offices and they are not allowed to go to their offices because the building may collapse at any moment.

We are still have aftershocks, some quite big. I really will be glad when they stop, hopefully within the next week.