Friday, March 11th passed as an ordinary weekday, except for one minute of silence at 2:46 pm. This is when the massive earthquake hit Eastern Japan five years ago, which triggered a series of tsunami.
“Disaster strikes when you least expect it” is usually translated to “天災は忘れた頃にやってくる”, but the Japanese version of it literally means “disaster strikes when people lose their memory (of the previous one)“. What it tells you is that you should always prepare for unexpected natural disasters. But for Japanese people today, it also means that we should bear in mind the victims and the sufferers of the disaater. Even today, many sufferers cannot come back to their home because their hometown was completely destroyed by the tsunami and the entire town is being rebuilt. Many others are still forced to evacuate due to the nuclear crisis. Thanks to the mass media, they are still fresh memory for us.
In an old post, I wrote income often hides unwanted reality. It is true especially when the job is very demanding and it makes me forget about everything else. Autually I wrote that post when I saw the city messed by a natural disaster, which evoked the emotion I had after the earthquake and tsunami. Now I have a full-time job. I have income. But I should remember that I had been unemployed until a few months ago, that the current job is only a temporary one, and that I am still a loser.
It’s been five years, but it doesn’t feel like that long. Is it because I’ve been so busy doing somethimg demanding, whether it is a job or job hunting? Anyways, I hope everyone in the disaster area will be happy someday and they can be proud of their hometown, and hope I’ll get a job someday that I can be proud of. We’ll see.