First, I would like to thank you all who's sent me the good wishes and asked me how're my people in Japan.
My family and friends in Japan are thankfully safe and sound. There are still after shocks happening almost everyday, and planed black out and nuclear threat, and some of them are getting really tired of always being under such stress, and actually getting sick from it, but there are more people who are suffering from bigger loss.
I have been away from home while this whole thing happened. And it was an extreme shock to hear the news came into my mailbox from NY Times alert mail. It was definitely one of the short list of things that I have alrways been worried about as being away home. To be honest, I was almost panicked and called and emailed my family and many of my good friends. I just wanted to make sure that they were safe. But of course it took a while to hear from them as all the cell phone line was jammed with crazy amount of access. When I got hold of my mom I was really releaved and eventually I got hold of my two sisters.
Definitely realized that when in such a chaotic situation, the only way that I got to hold of people was the Twitter. Since it's not on the phone line, and its on the internet, that was not jammed and I saw my friends family getting contact with each other on twitter, and setting up the meet up place or how to pick up the kids from school on the way home on foot, since all the trains were stopped till late night.
Just like in the situation of recent revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt, those SNS and twitter etc played their big role to actually help and support and protect people from the danger. So, seeing those communication made by my cousins and friends to confirm their safety on twitter was blowing my mind.
Through the internet, I get to watch the streaming news from Japan, and got to be informed everything happening at the very moment. I know I can't do very much from here for them, but in this crazy time, it was really important for me to be kept updated on everything what's going on there. There are a lot to think about in here. I was away from facebook for a while for many reasons, but I decided to come back.
Internet let me do one small thing to help from here for this time. It was via Google. They have made this program called Person Finder. It was a brilliant tool to gather the crazy amount of information of people who are either missing or are at the shelters and letting families know that they are there. More than 9000 photos of lists of hand written names are uploaded onto Picasa album of google. Volunteers open the folder, and digitalize the information and input data to person finder's system.
I've been spending some time volunteering on this Google Person Finder after work by now. It's devastating to think how many of them have lost the loved ones or still looking for them. When the death toll is announced on the news, as one big number, I think it carries the different impression about it. But looking at those hand written names of each person who their families are still looking for, it made me realized that those are so far over 13,500 cases of loss for families, and 17,400 cases of missing members for more families. It feels very much more personal as I type out the names and looking at those photos. Sometimes I cry while doing this process.
This whole tragedy has made me rethink about life. And made me aware of how anything that's around you can be taken away by just one moment, and they are not going to come back. When I think about it, I thought what is life for me and what is important in it, and what I need to or can do, or want to do in life. And I am extremely grateful for having my family and all of my friends and everyone who's acrossed my life and taught me things and spent time with me, even though people come and go sometime. I will not take that for granted.
I can only do small things, day by day, but I can appreciate them a lot.
Live it lively, and Not Waste It.
with love and a small smile :)
-Sachi
