Dirty Work in Progress

Digging mud from ditches and pouring it into sandbags and carrying them to dump sites is pretty messy. And standing at the bottom of debris-filled canals passing up buckets of slop is equally so. And low crawling clad in underwear under the floorboards of a house with only two feet clearance to scrape out tsunami mud isn't pleasant either. These are some of the things that All Hands crew volunteer for every day.

Even trying to clean an entire city block's sidewalks using only a 7-inch broom (proper push brooms don't seem to be available here) is pretty daunting and dusty.

Jo-Ann details a sidewalk with a mini-broom

But perhaps the pinnacle of nastiness arose in two recent projects that came our way. The city of Ofunato has a couple stinky problems on their hands. All Hands is trying to build credibility with the city by accepting some tough tasks, hoping to get more work for the volunteers later.

One of the odorous projects is a seaweed processing factory that remains full of packaged seaweed that needs to be disposed of. It has become a public health menace and nobody wants to deal with it. The work involves opening the packages of seaweed and carrying them outside where they can be scooped up my machine and disposed of. There are tons of the stuff. Several volunteers embraced this project willingly.

Lance relaxes in a pile of seaweed

The most disgusting task of all began yesterday. There is a fish processing factory that hasn't been cleaned out by its owners and there remain tons and tons of packaged fish that's been sitting there for three months. Three months-- imagine! Anyway, the environmental regulations prohibit dunping the packaging into the ocean. So the plastic wrappers need to be opened and all the plastic and cardboard removed (by hand) so the fish can be given a decent burial at sea.

The city has a hard time finding people to do this task. They even offered All Hands money to do it. But, of course, we offered to do it for free in order to curry favor. Once again, All Hands volunteers stepped into the breach. Donning hazmat suits and respirators, the volunteers spent the day at the cannery.

I happened to be on the bus delivering the boxed lunches to the cannery crew. OMG- what a stench! I carried the lunches in and didn't touch anything. I can't believe they could stomach a lunch after such work. And when they came back to base, our crew ended up on the same bus. One volunteer got off and walked home. I had my head out the window the whole way and it wasn't nearly effective. Even after a double treatment with Febreze, the bus reeked afterward. And the fish volunteers had to sit in the back at the nightly meeting.

There remain five more days before the fish project is completed. The buses and base will, I fear, be permanently affected. Sushi sales are expected to decline radically.

Lunch time at the Cannery

Chris rides the fish bus- no one sitting next to him

Satoshi and Mike prepare for lunch

Headed Home

Tonight, June 14, we take the overnight bus that leaves right from Ofunato and takes us directly to Ikebukuro station in Tokyo. Our friend Junji will meet us there and we will spend the day at his house and then head for a hotel in Tokyo.

It is hard to believe that our time in Ofunato is done.