Thursday, March 17, 2011 – Food and Water, The Last Mile Problem Fades

Morning

We woke this morning to this:

Text: Call me at 8am in Sendai at home. A lot to talk to you about. Our water is working! There was a lot of food from my cousin’s company!!

I couldn’t wait 8 hours to call her. What the heck. It was only midnight her time. I completely threw out my concerns about her not getting sleep. Good news about food and water trump sleep. One Worry at a Time. Because she was on the house phone and not her cell, we talked for about 10 minutes, our longest conversation yet. Our food crisis is solved for now. Yasue has about 3 weeks worth of food as long as she rations it carefully. By then, more of our efforts will likely have paid off. The boxes from her cousin’s company must have been packed by professional relief people – canned fish, dried fish, water, rice, etc. The much need protein she has been lacking. Now that this worry is solved, it is time FAB2 expand our operations. Our efforts must expand to help her neighbors and the hospital staff who gave us such peace in the first few days of the crisis. We will continue to get as much food as we can to her so that she can share with as many people as possible.

Also, as of right now, we will not have to tap the professional relief agencies when they get to Sendai and that will allow more food for those whose needs are much greater than ours.

Not only did we wake this morning to the wonderful news that Yasue has food, we also found out she now has running water at the house. And, she has some housemates. The PS&S reporting crew that brought her the food on Monday are still in Sendai and will be staying with her at least a night or two. The house is much more comfortable for them than the emergency evacuation shelters they have been staying in. It is a blessing to be able to pay them back. It is also comforting to know they are there to help if needed.

Night

Yasue was able to relax today. She called her mom but did not visit her. She is still cleaning the house. Her mom did share things are improving at the hospital too. She said the food cart came by today and patients were able to get more food. Before the quake, the cart would come around daily with juices, food etc. for patients to supplement the hospital food. Her mom also said she got more food with each meal today.

The PS&S crew headed back to Tokyo.

Relatively speaking, this afternoon was really boring and I have never been so thankful for boredom.