Far away from Namie Town (The case of flute player Momoka Kanno)

The interviews with the band members are usually conducted in a hurry between joint practice sessions in Fukushima City, but since there is still some time until the summer training camp in August, we once again asked two band members to take the time to talk to us. What they have in common is that they are from Namie Town, Fukushima Prefecture, the town closest to the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, located only about 4km away. On March 31st last year, the evacuation order for part of the town was lifted. However, both band members are currently attending music universities in Tokyo, and their families have not returned to Namie Town.

At the Tohoku Youth Orchestra Concert 2018 in March of this year, for the first time, the orchestra attempted to perform works composed by its members on stage. Dai Fujikura, a contemporary composer who has attracted attention from around the world, is in fact a long-time fan of director Ryuichi Sakamoto, and so at the end of last year, Fujikura organized a composition workshop for the orchestra members, and six members who wanted to take part were able to present the results of their work at the concert.

Momoka Kanno, who plays the flute, was one such composer. When I introduced myself at the rehearsal as "a first-year university student from Iwaki City, Fukushima Prefecture," it turned out that this was the information she had given when she applied to join the orchestra, and later she cheerfully said, "Actually, I'm from Namie Town, but my family home has been demolished and I'm now living in Iwaki City as an evacuee. Please introduce me in Namie Town." The title of the piece she created is "Obvious Happiness." I realized that she has a desire to express herself through the Tohoku Youth Orchestra. When I asked her if I could find some time to interview her, she replied, "I'll tell you anything if you ask me. In fact, I'd like to talk to you."

We managed to find time to sit down with Mr. Sugano, a busy second-year flute student at the Tokyo College of Music who lives in Saitama and attends school in Ikebukuro, to talk for an hour and a half at a family restaurant in Shinjuku on a weekday morning.

Thank you for taking the time to come out today despite your busy schedule. Why do you live in Saitama instead of near the school?

Soundproof rooms are expensive. But it's convenient because it's only a train ride away from the school. The school will be moving to Daikanyama next year.

That's a problem that only music students have. If I were to rent a soundproof room near the fashionable Daikanyama area, it would be expensive.

I probably won’t be able to move (laughs).

Today I would like to talk about 3/11 again. I would like to ask you about your experiences since then. I'm sure there are some things you don't want to remember, so if you don't want to answer, please be honest and say that you don't want to. Thank you very much. What year were you born, Mr. Kanno?

I was born in Iwaki in 1999, but I moved to Namie soon after. That's why I call myself a native of Namie.

If you were born in1999 , you would have been 12 years old at the time of the earthquake.

I was in the sixth grade at Namie Elementary School and we were practicing for the graduation ceremony that day. We were all in a classroom on the third floor, where only children were present, when suddenly at 2:46pm the shaking started. The station PA system said to "hide under your desks," but the shaking was so strong that the desks were moving and it was impossible to stand, so all we could do was crouch down. I was deeply shocked when I saw the surrounding houses collapsing from the classroom window. It is still etched in my mind.

We were instructed to evacuate to the schoolyard, but unlike regular evacuation drills, many things on campus were strewn about and the shoe lockers had fallen over, so we managed to climb up and get out into the school building.

While I was frightened by the cold and the constant aftershocks, it started to snow. It rarely snows in the Hama (Street) area of Fukushima Prefecture, even in winter, and of course it never snows in March, so I felt very ominous. Around that time, the tsunami was coming near the sea. The elementary school closest to the sea was washed away without a trace.

I only found out about the tsunami at night because there was a power outage. Both of my parents were elementary school teachers. When the disaster occurred, they were busy taking care of their students.

In fact, my sister had just finished her junior high school graduation ceremony and her high school entrance exams, and was relaxing at home when the earthquake hit. Our house has a tiled roof, and when she ran out of the house, a lot of tiles fell on her, and she was in danger.

(Photo of roof tiles that fell from the family home taken during a temporary return three years later)

How did you meet your family after that?

Fortunately, my parents were able to contact my older sister, who had taken refuge at her piano teacher's house in a relatively new condominium apartment next door.

At around 7pm, my father, who was a teacher at an elementary school in Okuma, came to pick me up from school. I had heard my friend, who had evacuated with me at school, talk to his parents on the phone, saying that the apartment (where we lived) had been completely destroyed and collapsed, so I was prepared for the worst, but our house was still standing, although in the worst condition. After confirming this, I was hungry, so I went to the city hall gymnasium to have some pork soup that was being served.

Only our parents' bedroom was safe, so my sisters and I slept in their bed. They spent the night in the living room. We were worried that the house might collapse at any moment.

At that time, nuclear power plants were already in a dangerous state, right?

The next day, at 6am, my parents woke me up in a panic. "We're evacuating. We're worried about the nuclear plant, so we're evacuating the whole town." I wondered why the people of Namie, a town of 20,000, were heading toward the mountains in traffic jams. There were six of us in the car, including my grandparents, who lived nearby. I only had a blanket and some snacks. We fled from the center of town to the Tsushima district, north inland.

The evacuation center was overflowing with people. I later learned that Tsushima had the highest radiation dose at that time. So I went to my relative's grandma's house in Tsushima for the first time in a while. I had somen noodles for lunch and was watching the live coverage of the earthquake on TV when the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant exploded. I actually heard a "bang" explosion at my grandma's house. Two reactors exploded, and I realized that something terrible was happening. My parents said, "Let's get away," and at 9pm we got in the car and headed to Koriyama City. We headed there without any destination in mind, but we looked up an evacuation center that was accepting residents living near the nuclear power plant, and when we got there, we were surprised to see so many people from the beach there.

The next day, on March 13th, my cousin from Niigata came to the evacuation centre in Koriyama, which was very reassuring. It was just a simple encouragement, but just seeing them made me feel at ease. He also took my grandparents from Namie to Niigata. The four of us who remained as a family had no clothes, so we decided to buy some at Shimamura. When we went to the store in Koriyama, the staff and customers were there as usual, and we wondered why we were the only ones who had to go through this. Even though we were in the same prefecture, the way we spent our time was so different.

We got bread at the evacuation center, charged our phones, bought some blankets that we needed, and waited in line at a gas station for an hour or two. We were busy. Then, when we returned to the evacuation center from the previous day, we found that we only had three blankets left, and none of the many people there had been. We found out that the evacuation center had been closed. It was a privately run super public bath, so it couldn't be helped.

Then we hurriedly searched for a place to evacuate. We found out about a shelter at a school for the deaf in Koriyama that was accepting evacuees from Namie Town, so we moved there. I remember how relieved we were when the staff welcomed us kindly, even though it was night. Miso soup, rice balls. It had been a long time since we had eaten something warm. However, the shelter was also a small Japanese-style room with three or four families, and although we managed to survive for three days, we got tired of it, so we moved to Niigata, where my cousin's house was. We stayed at my cousin's house, where my grandparents had evacuated earlier, for one night, but the next day we rented a six-tatami room apartment that my parents had arranged for us, and stayed there for about a week. Sometimes my cousin would take us to the nearby Aeon Mall for a change of pace, but the huge contrast with our everyday lives there was a shock, and we wondered what on earth we were doing.

Even at that time, I was worried about my elementary school graduation ceremony. I had been informed that the elementary school graduation ceremony in Namie Town had been canceled, but I thought I would be able to return to Namie at the beginning of April. But then my parents told me, "You can't return for a while," and although I hadn't cried until then, I burst into tears for the first time. I didn't even know where my friends were.

On the day of 3/11, I was waiting at elementary school and said goodbye to my best friend at the time, saying, "See you tomorrow. But I'm sure you'll be busy cleaning up the school tomorrow." But I never saw that friend again.

After that, I met her once in Sendai when I was in the second year of junior high school. When I met her, my brain froze. I realized that I was actually supposed to spend my junior high school years with her. Now we wear different uniforms and live apart in different places. We had bought uniforms and jerseys for the local junior high school in the same town of Namie. But we couldn't wear them together. I remember thinking about that for three hours as we talked about what we had both experienced after 3/11. She moved to her grandmother's house in Yamagata, and that was the last time we saw each other.

My older sister passed the entrance exam for Iwaki High School, so we decided to rent an apartment in Iwaki City. I ended up attending a completely unknown junior high school. On the day of the entrance ceremony, I was taken to a classroom, told to choose a uniform that fit me, changed into the junior high school uniform, and went straight to the entrance ceremony. At first, the class was made up of children from areas that were severely affected by the nuclear accident, so that was reassuring.

Have you ever returned to your parents' home in Namie Town since the disaster?

I have returned home twice so far. The first time was on March 23, 2014. Because of the high radiation levels, only people over 15 years old were allowed to enter. I was happy to be back home after such a long time, but when I entered my house, I was shocked by how dilapidated it was. There were fat rats running around. There were obvious signs of burglary in my house. I regretted telling my parents when I was in elementary school that I wanted to move to a bigger house.

(The exterior of his family home, photographed when he returned home temporarily wearing protective gear for the first time)

This is a standard question I always ask when interviewing members.How has your experience of 3/11 changed you?

Now, people in the affected areas say that they "grew up through the disaster," but the stories reported on TV and in the media seem like lies. If there's one thing I learned from the disaster, it's that "there's nothing more satisfying than the things we take for granted." We lost our homes and our money. In reality, many people died in the tsunami. The newborn daughter of a teacher I knew well was swept away by the tsunami along with her grandmother. I can't say to those who lost loved ones in the disaster that I "grew up through the disaster." Some people died because they were driven to the brink by the nuclear accident.

"We have grown through the earthquake."
I can't just say something so casually like that.

I went through a very difficult time, but I'm grateful that my parents were there to help me. My motto in middle school and high school was, "I don't want people to say that I was a victim of the disaster." I didn't want to be shunned as a child from Namie Town. In fact, I failed the radiation test I took when I was first evacuated to Koriyama, and I also failed a thyroid test when I was in middle school. Some of my friends stopped going to school. I don't have that kind of knowledge about nuclear power, but I don't really understand people who say it's necessary. I don't understand why nuclear power plants even exist.

It was hard to live normally. But I don't think that this is hard work. My parents provided everything for me. I am just grateful to my parents for providing me with an environment where I could live without any inconvenience. Now I am able to go to music college, and I am really grateful to my parents every day.

When did you realize you wanted to go to music college?

When I was in the second year of junior high school in Iwaki City, I had the opportunity to listen to an amateur reconstruction concert by doctors. For some reason, it felt as if they were performing just for me, and it touched my heart and moved me. At that time, I thought that if I became a professional performer, I might be able to help someone someday. I had been playing the flute and piano since elementary school. I joined the brass band in the high school club in Iwaki, and since it was a very enthusiastic school, I devoted myself to the flute.

What do you want to do with the Tohoku Youth Orchestra in the future?

I happened to find out about the Tohoku Youth Orchestra when I was searching on my smartphone during my third year of high school. I read the purpose of the orchestra and thought, "There's an orchestra that's perfect for me!" and I was very happy. I had no experience in an orchestra up until then. After passing the entrance exam for Tokyo College of Music, I called the office and asked, "I want to join the Tohoku Youth Orchestra. Are you recruiting members?" and I was able to become a member from the third term last year.

Not all of the members of the orchestra have had the same experience as me, so if I have the opportunity, I would like to talk about my experience with them. As a person from the same region who has experienced something like this, I think it will be easier for the Tohoku Youth Orchestra to carry out meaningful activities. I don't mind talking. Sometimes I feel like crying, though.

What did music mean to you after 3/11?

I think there are things I can convey through music. When I think about it, I was involved in an unprecedented accident in Japan, and it was a valuable experience. Of course, it's not fun to tell people about what happened, just like telling people about war, but I feel the importance of telling them. Maybe it's my responsibility as one of tens of thousands of people. I think even just talking a little bit can be meaningful. The Tohoku Youth Orchestra is working under someone as well-known around the world as Director Sakamoto, so I think it would be a waste not to tell them. If people want, I'll talk about the earthquake. I evacuated because of the earthquake, and now I feel this way.

I believe that it is possible to communicate not only through words, but also through music. That is why I want to perform with the perspective of those who have experienced the disaster in mind.

I have never once considered myself to be recovering.

I believe that the Tohoku Youth Orchestra is a place where I can grow.
I want to tell people about the disaster. I can't go back home, I can't see my friends. I can't go back to the town I loved so much.

But, if I had to say, I feel like my mind has recovered and I've become stronger.

Ms. Kanno took the time out of her busy schedule between her studies and part-time job to speak with me. I'm sure there were many difficult moments, but thank you very much.

"I have never thought of myself as being in recovery."

This statement left a very strong impression on me.

Human life itself is irreplaceable, and no matter how much one believes in reincarnation, this life that we are given here and now is a one-time thing. However, not only life, but all things and emotions, once lost, they can never be regained.

Nowadays, we can undo a mistaken operation on a computer with a simple keystroke, and restore lost digital data from a backup, but in reality, this is not the case in the real world. Once a roof tile falls, it remains broken. Even if another similar roof tile can be substituted, it will simply be different from the previous one. The same can be said about human relationships such as friendship. Feelings that are once separated or lost cannot be returned. As Eastern and Western philosophers in the pre-Christian era said, "You cannot step into the same river twice."

I am beginning to think that perhaps the very idea of "reconstruction" is unreasonable. Rather than "restoring" or "reconstructing" things to the way they were, perhaps it would be better to adopt the ideas of "revival" or "re-co-creation," creating something new together.

Kanno told me that, based on his own experiences, there is something that can be communicated through music. What can music do? While thinking about this, I happened to have a new book by Tetsuro Matsuzawa, who has been studying chimpanzees for many years at the Primate Research Institute of Kyoto University, titled "The Evolution of a Sharing Mind ." Wild chimpanzees communicate something through sound by "doing something together" and "matching their breath" while coordinating rhythm and tempo with their peers through voices and drumming. Sound carries information. As a result, it has been pointed out that both the sender and the receiver use their "power of imagination" to visualize things that cannot be seen in front of them. Citing examples of language, painting, and cooking in addition to music, he states his idea that art is "developing the power of imagination" and "something to share."

The Tohoku Youth Orchestra is a mixed orchestra connected only by the condition that we are all of the same generation who experienced 3/11 in three prefectures. The members, who are in different environments and positions, play one piece of music together while imagining each other's experiences and thoughts. The joy of this coincidence is shared not only with the members themselves, but also with those who support and listen to this performance. I realized once again that this in itself is already a message. Of course, this is accompanied by an improvement in the quality of the performance content.

In any case, by listening carefully to the experiences and current thoughts of the members from Namie Town, I was able to reaffirm the significance of continuing the Tohoku Youth Orchestra. That's how I feel. I plan to introduce an interview with another member from Namie Town soon.

Finally, we would like to express our heartfelt condolences to those affected by the heavy rains that hit Western Japan this month. If there is anything the Tohoku Youth Orchestra can do to help, please do not hesitate to contact us.
I hope we can return to our normal lives soon.

We appreciate your continued support for the Tohoku Youth Orchestra.