{"id":108,"date":"2021-08-23T18:52:49","date_gmt":"2021-08-23T18:52:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/jbaylis3\/reactions-to-fukushima-part-2\/"},"modified":"2021-08-23T20:19:40","modified_gmt":"2021-08-23T20:19:40","slug":"reactions-to-fukushima-part-2","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/jbaylis3\/migrated-posts\/reactions-to-fukushima-part-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Reactions to Fukushima (part 2)"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
Protest is one logical reaction to the Fukushima disaster, especially in the face of a government that doesn\u2019t seem particularly concerned with preventing similar disasters in the future.\u00a0 For those most directly effected by the meltdowns, though, there is a certain and very real sense in which the anti-nuclear protests and the aims they hope to achieve, even if they are ever realized, come too late.\u00a0 I\u2019m referring of course to the residents of the towns immediately around the failed nuclear complex \u2013 the people who were ordered to leave their communities and have barely had the opportunity to return since.\u00a0 I had the chance to sit down and talk with one of them \u2013 Kanda Nozomi \u2013 while in Tokyo, on what was incidentally the day before the Friday night demonstration described in my previous post. She was born and raised in the town of Futaba, which lies in the shadow of the Fukushima Daiichi power plant, a stone\u2019s throw to the south in neighboring Okuma.\u00a0 Kanda-san knew Fukushima Daiichi long before it became a global synonym for nuclear catastrophe and contamination.\u00a0 Her community\u2019s relation to the plant, to TEPCO, and to the aftermath of the disaster differs in pivotal ways from the position of most participants in the anti-nuclear protests.<\/div>\n
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A Reunion, of Sorts<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> This was not my first occasion to meet Kanda-san.\u00a0 That happened back in April, when we were both speakers at an event held at Brown University, along with Kiyama Keiko of the Japan Emergency NGO (JEN), to commemorate the passing of a year since the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake and Tsunami and provide some appreciation of what has \u2013 and hasn\u2019t \u2013 been done in terms of reconstruction since.\u00a0 At that event, Kanda-san spoke powerfully about the loss of both her home and her community, of being forced to leave the area under government order before she even had a chance to search for her grandfather \u2013 who remains missing to this day.\u00a0 At that time, her voice shook under the emotional weight of the experiences she recounted.\u00a0 Many at the event were moved to tears.<\/p>\n

Kanda-san has been changed by her experiences since 3\/11 \u2013 who wouldn\u2019t be in the same situation? \u2013 but she has not succumbed to despair.\u00a0 The experience urged her to establish an NGO of her own, \u201cPower of Japan\u201d (POJ), initially for the purpose of helping the refugees from Futaba cope with their situation.\u00a0 It has since taken on the cause of helping victims of the disaster for other parts of Tohoku as well.\u00a0 In talking with her both before and after the event at Brown, I found her to be a very easy-going person \u2013 the kind in whom you can sense an inner strength and sense of purpose that makes it possible for her to stay relaxed and positive while maintaining resilience and poise.\u00a0 She is one of the hisaisha<\/em> who found themselves forced out of the ordinary by the disaster and its aftermath, and rose to the challenge to do extraordinary things, big and small.<\/p>\n

I contacted Kanda-san soon after I got to Japan, and we arranged to meet on July 19th<\/sup>.\u00a0 This was not only the day before the anti-nuclear protest but, more significantly for Kanda-san and Futaba, a couple of days after the government announced a revised map of the various evacuation zones around the Fukushima Daiichi plant, in light of ongoing surveys of levels of radioactive contamination.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Map taken from the July 19th<\/sup> edition of The Daily Yomiuri newspaper<\/em><\/p>\n

The rezoning didn\u2019t really change much for the people of Futaba in the present \u2013 their homes and businesses had been off-limits for all but the briefest of visits (two hours at most \u2013 and permission for even that did not come until months after the evacuation) \u2013 but what it did make clear was, much as Kanda-san and others had feared, there would be no going back to live in Futaba for the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not like we didn\u2019t see this coming,\u201d she said as we walked the short distance from the station where we arranged to meet to a nearby Chinese restaurant where her friend and fellow POJ member Yamanobe Hitoshi worked as head chef.\u00a0 \u201cBut to see Futaba marked as a \u2018no entry zone,\u2019 without any mention of when it might be opened\u2026it makes it seem so final.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nuclear Co-dependence<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yamanobe-san\u2019s restaurant is an upscale place in an equally posh part of the city on Ten\u014dz\u016b Isle.\u00a0 We arrive at the end of the lunchtime rush, so we are seated immediately.\u00a0 Kanda-san asks our server to inform Yamanobe-san of our arrival.<\/p>\n

She begins to talk about Futaba and its relation to Fukushima Daiichi and TEPCO.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe thing you have to understand about Futaba is that, before they built the power plant, there really wasn\u2019t much there to support the town.\u00a0 There was fishing and farming, of course, but nobody was making a lot of money off of them.\u00a0 Coal mining in Fukushima was on the decline already by that point.\u00a0 So when TEPCO came in with plans to build a plant, the promise of jobs it would bring into the community and the money that TEPCO threw around locally in lobbying for it got them a lot of support.\u00a0 The proposal passed through the town assembly easily.\u00a0 No one in Futaba seemed all that concerned about radiation back then.\u201d<\/p>\n

TEPCO\u2019s search for a location for a new nuclear power facility began in the late 1950s, with the selection of the Okuma site coming a few years later.\u00a0 By 1971, the first reactor of what would eventually be six at the plant was on line.\u00a0 The other five achieved the same status in short order across the remainder of the decade.<\/p>\n

This sounded like a familiar industry scenario.\u00a0 When I lived in Fukui Prefecture years ago, I had heard similar tales of how Kansai Electric Power Co. won approval to build its facility in Ohi.\u00a0 There too, they selected a poor, out-of-the-way community as their prospective site, and swooped in with the promise of jobs and lots of cash to secure the support of the residents.\u00a0 People told me stories of villagers who blew this windfall on things like gaudy, fake crystal chandeliers to hang from the ceilings of rooms that were barely large enough to accommodate them.<\/p>\n

If anything, TEPCO\u2019s hold on Futaba might have been even tighter than KEPCO\u2019s was on Ohi.\u00a0 Prior to the disaster, Kanda-san surmises that about 80% of the town\u2019s working aged population, out of a population of only 8,000 residents in total, were employed by TEPCO or one of its many subcontractors.\u00a0 Work in the subcontracting firms was dirty and dangerous, compounded by the threat of exposure to radiation while engaging in cleaning and other routine maintenance jobs inside the plant.\u00a0 By law, nuclear industry workers are were not allowed to absorb more than 100 milliSieverts per year (that is, until the Japanese government requested this limited raised to 250 milliSiverts, in light of the mess at Fukushima Daiichi), so they have to wear dosimeters to keep track of their cumulative exposure while at work.\u00a0 (By sheer coincidence, a few days after our meeting, the Asahi shinbun<\/em> broke a story about the tricks one of TEPCO\u2019s subcontractors had used to deceive the dosimeters, involving lead covers that employees were urged to place in their breast pockets to cut down on the amount of radiation the device would register, thus allowing each worker to put in more time at the plant.)\u00a0 Be that as it may, the pay was excellent for such simple work; far more than one could make on any other jobs to be found in the area.\u00a0 A subcontract employee could make 15,000 yen (around $190 at current exchange rates) for just two hours of work.\u00a0 For employees of TEPCO proper, wages were even better, and came with other perks, such as housing.\u00a0 For young women in Futaba and their parents, \u201cTEPCO men\u201d were highly sought after marriage partners.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything in the town seemed to have something to do with the plant and TEPCO,\u201d Kanda-san recalled.\u00a0 \u201cEven the local playgrounds had equipment donated by the company.\u00a0 It never really occurred to most people that the plant might pose a danger to the town.\u201d<\/p>\n

Evacuation and Exile<\/strong><\/p>\n

Within hours after the tsunami knocked out power to the plant\u2019s cooling systems, it began to do just that.\u00a0 It was almost 10pm on the 11th<\/sup> when the residents of Futaba \u2013 those within a 2km radius of the plant, at least \u2013 first heard over the loud speakers installed in their neighborhoods for just such an unthinkable event as this that they should evacuate.\u00a0 Kanda-san had taken refuge from the tsunami in the gym of a local school along with many other survivors. They were puzzled by the terse and vague nature of the announcement, which merely told them that there was a situation developing at the power plant, and that they should \u201cmove further south.\u201d\u00a0 In fact, she and other at the school ended up being bussed to a hinanjo<\/em> in Kawamata \u2013 over 40 kilometers to the northwest of Futaba.\u00a0 Still, they were among the lucky ones.\u00a0 Others in Futaba weren\u2019t so lucky; elderly bedridden patients in the municipal hospital, for example, were finally airlifted to safe hospitals on the 13th<\/sup> \u2013 but only after the hydrogen explosion that destroyed reactor building #1 had scattered radioactive material high into the air.\u00a0 On the ground, too, the disparity in information caused problems.\u00a0 Despite the rapid expansion of the evacuation zone around the plant from an initial radius of 2km out to 20km, residents of the town of Namie \u2013 just to the north of Futaba \u2013 didn\u2019t receive the order to flee until March 14th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n

For the people of Futaba, this was the beginning of the dispersal of their community.\u00a0 The shelter in Kawamata to which they were sent \u2013 another school gymnasium \u2013 was not large enough to accommodate everyone.\u00a0\u00a0 The overflow was moved from here to other facilities even further away.\u00a0 For there, some residents booked flights out of Fukushima airport for Tokyo or destinations in western Japan.\u00a0\u00a0 Some moved in with friends and relatives elsewhere in Fukushima Prefecture or in neighboring areas.\u00a0 Some managed to gain access to temporary housing in Fukushima city after a long wait.\u00a0 The remainder \u2013 mostly elderly folks with no connections they could rely on outside of Futaba and little money to spare \u2013 ended up in Kazo-city, Saitama Prefecture, where they managed to gain access to the building of a school that had been closed due to the decline in the number of children in the area.\u00a0 Kanda-san, who had eventually relocated to Chiba Prefecture in the aftermath, initially launched POJ to look after the needs of this community of Futaba exiles in Kazo.<\/p>\n

The Persistence of Place<\/strong><\/p>\n

Our waitress informs us that Yamanobe-san is waiting for us in one of the banquet rooms, so we carry our conversation there.\u00a0 Yamanobe-san greet us in his chef\u2019s tunic, unbuttoned as far down his chest as it will go in evidence of the rigors of the lunchtime rush, but spotless, in evidence of his skill as a chef under pressure.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Yamanobe Hitoshi, taken from among the pictures of him on Facebook without permission (sorry!)<\/em><\/p>\n

I somehow failed to ask about how the two met \u2013 a stupid oversight on my part \u2013 but however it happened, Yamanobe-san has been involved with POJ from the very start, employing his expertise in preparing meals for the exiles in Kazo and hisaisha<\/em> in other locations.\u00a0 He tells me that he began doing this on the night of March 11, 2011, when his restaurant became an impromptu shelter for people stranded on Ten\u014dz\u016b Isle by the loss of power and interruption of train service in Tokyo.\u00a0 \u201cWe had food we needed to get rid of because the refrigerators were out, and I wasn\u2019t going anywhere myself, so I thought the least I could do was feed the people who were stuck here.\u201d\u00a0 And they ate for free.<\/p>\n

Kanda-san resumes her account of the Futaba exiles when I ask her what will become of them.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey want to live together someplace, and preferably someplace like Futaba.\u00a0 By that I mean a place with a culture, accent, and scenery like home.\u201d<\/p>\n

This makes sense.\u00a0 Small communities are close knit, and there is no reason to assume that Futaba, as much as it was influenced by the wealth of TEPCO\u2019s dangerous enterprise nearby, would be any different.\u00a0 I had heard of a section of temporary housing units in Fukushima-city known as \u201cLittle Namie\u201d because it was occupied almost exclusively by evacuees from Futaba\u2019s neighbor to the north.\u00a0 I ask Kanda-san if she has something similar in mind for her neighbors for Futaba.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, in a way that kind of thing exists already \u2013 but not in an ideal situation.\u00a0 Really, that\u2019s pretty much what we have in Nazo.\u00a0 The only problem is that Saitama and Fukushima are different.\u00a0 The climate and landscape are different, the accent is different, even the food is different.\u00a0 The older folks from Futaba would much rather live someplace in Fukushima Prefecture.\u00a0 We\u2019ve been trying to see if we can reestablish Futaba in Iwaki-city.\u201d<\/p>\n

Iwaki is the largest city to the immediate south of the 20km perimeter.\u00a0 Kanda-san tells me that, in terms of all the differences she just listed in regard to Futaba and Kazo, Iwaki is a much closer match.\u00a0 I ask her what the prospects are for a \u201cLittle Futaba\u201d in Iwaki.<\/p>\n

\u201cNot good.\u00a0 Iwaki has it\u2019s own problems to deal with from the tsunami and the influx of refugees from the nuclear situation.\u00a0 Also, there\u2019s a problem with the logistics of setting up one municipality within the jurisdiction of another \u2013 I guess there\u2019s really no precedent for that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The term she uses in Japanese for municipality is \u201cjichitai<\/em>\u201d \u2013 literally \u201cself-governing body\u201d \u2013 but the sense I got was that what she had in mind was the preservation of Futaba as its own incorporated unit, no matter where its members happened to reside.\u00a0 I can see were this would present problems for the town to host such a community.\u00a0 Who would they pay taxes to, for example?\u00a0 I also found myself wondering \u2013 later \u2013 why Kanda-san was so focused of recreating Futaba as a municipality \u2013 and not just as an informal community \u2013 elsewhere. \u201cLittle Namie,\u201d in Fukushima city, has not been incorporated as a new municipality in exile within the prefectural capital \u2013 The site of the Namie municipal government in exile is actually in Nihonmatsu, to the south.\u00a0 I get the sense that for Kanda-san and others, insuring the survival of the community in the face of such an unconventional situation calls for the assurance of official recognition.\u00a0 An informal \u201cLittle Futaba\u201d will last for a generation at most; after that, descendants of the original residents will have at best a very thin \u2013 and possibly negative \u2013 sense of association with the abandoned town.\u00a0 As an incorporated municipality, of course, things might be different \u2013 but only if it comes to pass.<\/p>\n

But if a community in any form is going to remain viable it needs people in it.\u00a0 I ask Kanda-san how many of the town\u2019s residents are interested in returning to Futaba \u2013 wherever it is to be located.<\/p>\n

\u201cMost of the people who want to stay are elderly,\u201d she says.\u00a0 \u201cOnly about 50% of the young people have expressed an interest in going back.\u201d<\/p>\n

Under the circumstances, 50% seems like a lot.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut even the young people who aren\u2019t interested in going back might change their minds in the future \u2013 if Futaba still exists, that is.\u00a0 They may not decide to move back and live there, but they\u2019d probably go back and visit.\u00a0 If it\u2019s there and it\u2019s their hometown, they\u2019ll go back. I think that\u2019s just part of who you are.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Kanda-san herself, the Futaba she used to live in has become a truly important place \u2013 probably more important than it was to her prior to 3\/11.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo be honest, finding another place is just a substitute.\u00a0 I\u2019d like to go back to Futaba to live someday, even if I have to decontaminate the area myself \u2013 actually, I\u2019d rather do it that way.\u00a0 I think it would be better if the people who returned took part in decontaminating their hometown.\u00a0 But it\u2019s not going to happen \u2013 at least not for a long, long time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kanda-san then tells me of a man from Futaba in his 60s who committed suicide inside his abandoned home during one of the two-hour visits that he and others had been allowed to collect valuables.<\/p>\n

Living \u201cFukushima\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

In light of the growing size of the weekly demonstrations around the Diet, I ask what people from Futaba think about nuclear power and the anti-nuclear movement.\u00a0 Surprisingly \u2013 or perhaps not so surprisingly \u2013 their feelings are mixed.\u00a0 The meltdowns took away their homes and livelihoods, but in some cases these were homes and livelihoods that TEPCO, or at least the presence of its plant in the area, had made possible in some way.\u00a0 It would be hard to ignore the importance of TEPCO money in supporting the local economy.\u00a0 She tells me this with no intention of excusing TEPCO for the disaster or suggesting that the residents of Futaba feel no resentment toward it.\u00a0 Resentment is strong, and in the case of some people from the town, it has convinced them to join the protests.<\/p>\n

As for Kanda-san herself, though, while she agrees with the aims of the anti-nuclear movement, she is much too busy with POJ to get involved, and it would be a deviation from POJ\u2019s mission to take it in a political direction.\u00a0 Furthermore, although she sympathizes with many protestors\u2019 feelings, she admits to me that she feels a vague sense of annoyance whenever she sees pictures of protestors carrying placards that read \u201cNo More Fukushimas.\u201d\u00a0 For her, Fukushima is more than just a nuclear worst-case scenario.\u00a0 To reduce its meaning to just that one dimension strikes her as very similar to the way of thinking that leads people to avoid having anything to do with Fukushima \u2013 its products and people \u2013 out of fear of nuclear contamination.<\/p>\n

Although there are good reasons to be concerned about radiation exposure, as I\u2019ve said before in this blog, the problem is that we don\u2019t have a very clear, scientific understanding yet about what long-term low-level exposure can do.\u00a0 Instead, many people seem to react with a kind of \u201cconsciousness of defilement\u201d (kegare ishiki<\/em>) when they encounter something or someone from Fukushima.\u00a0 Fortunately, it appears that incidents of outright discrimination are less common than they were last summer.\u00a0 Schools into which children from the evacuated areas have transferred are doing a better job of educating the rest of the students on the nature of radioactive contamination, including an emphasis on the fact that you can\u2019t \u201ccatch\u201d it from someone, as a countermeasure against the kind of ostracism and bullying transferees faced in the early months.\u00a0 This seems to be having a positive impact.\u00a0 Likewise, although harder to grasp, it seems that adults too are less inclined than they were in the immediate aftermath to react to a Fukushima license plate in their parking lot with a sense of aversion.<\/p>\n

But for Kanda-san and others, these changes, while appreciated, don\u2019t do much to alleviate another emotionally taxing dimension of the nuclear exile situation: just as these people don\u2019t want to be ostracized, neither do they wish to become objects of others\u2019 pity.\u00a0 Yet in many ways the media\u2019s portrayal of their plight in recent months, especially now that the media seems to have committed itself to criticizing TEPCO and the government\u2019s handling of the crisis, has made them the poster children of the whole nation\u2019s sense of sacrifice on the alter of corporate greed and administrative callousness.\u00a0 This is another reason why Kanda-san hopes to establish a \u201cLittle Futaba\u201d somewhere in Fukushima Prefecture: at the very least, within Fukushima everyone bears the same association with a disaster that made the name of their home prefecture an international symbol of nuclear catastrophe; with one another, there\u2019s no need to explain oneself or thank others for their inevitable words of sympathy.<\/p>\n

This is where Yamanobe-san comes in.\u00a0 He feels that if people really want to show their empathy with the plight of the people in Fukushima, they should make a point of buying things from there, in order to help farmers and manufacturers in Fukushima save their businesses.\u00a0 \u201cThere\u2019s a strong NIMBY component to the anti-nuclear movement.\u00a0 People may feel bad for the folks in places like Futaba, but the real point of their concern is a fear of radiation in their neighborhood, in their food, and in their bodies.\u00a0 This makes sense on one level, of course, but it seems unfair to me to use Fukushima as a kind of slogan to rally around, but at the same time to make no effort to help those who suffer the adverse effects of that association.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since the disaster and the discovery of hot spots well outside of the perimeter, agricultural produce from Fukushima has been all but impossible to sell to wholesalers and distributors.\u00a0 The reason for such avoidance is easy to understand, but it is also misguided.\u00a0 The government now allows Fukushima produce to be sold on the market, as long as at is screened for radiation first and found to be at or below the level of 100 Becquerel per kilogram.\u00a0 The government distributed screening machines to towns and cities, and local agricultural associations have acquired their own to run tests on their produce.\u00a0 Furthermore, producers have decided to lower the admissible levels of radiation to well under 100 Bq per kilogram.\u00a0 This produce may in fact be safer that foodstuffs produced outside of the prefecture, due to the far-flung and insidious nature of hot spot formation.<\/p>\n

Just telling people this wouldn\u2019t be enough to restore their trust and peace of mind, of course.\u00a0 As a restaurateur, however, Yamanobe-san is in a perfect position to do something about this.\u00a0 At his own restaurant, he has been using only vegetables produced in Fukushima, and he is working to get other restaurateurs to join him.\u00a0 The menu informs customers of the source of the vegetables and the fact that they have been judged safe under stricter standards than the government requires.\u00a0 So far, he says, there\u2019s been no appreciable drop in business, nor have his colleagues promoting \u201cgrown in Fukushima\u201d produce noticed any detrimental impact on their turnover.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur hope is to get a major producers of food products to sign on and advertise the fact.\u00a0 Maybe the cafeteria at the national Diet could sign on as well,\u201d he adds, with a touch of irony.\u00a0 \u201cThat would be one thing they could do to help.\u201d<\/p>\n

Conviction<\/strong><\/p>\n

I am impressed by the sincerity of both of these people.\u00a0 They may be fighting an impossible battle in some ways, but I hope not.\u00a0 It\u2019s a horrible thing to forsake an entire region and its way of life \u2013 consigning all of these things to the trash heap of history for something entirely beyond the responsibility or control of those living there.\u00a0 But it is also an all too easy thing to do \u2013 without even really thinking about \u2013 if you have no connection to such places to begin with.\u00a0 As I consider this, I can\u2019t help but feel that these areas are being treated in much the same was as the conveniently evasive military term \u201ccollateral damage\u201d treats the lives of innocents caught in the crossfire.<\/p>\n

Kanda-san and Yamanobe-san have risen above any bitterness they might be entitled to feel \u2013 at least as far as I can tell.\u00a0 Far from focusing only on the plight of folks in Fukushima, moreover, through POJ they have reached out to help hisaisha<\/em> in other parts of Tohoku, for whom the crisis at Fukushima Daiichi is a much less pressing concern.\u00a0 Despite the particularity of the experience of back-to-back natural and man-made disasters, Kanda-san prefers to focus on the bonds among fellow hisaisha<\/em>, and between hisaisha<\/em> and others, and to turn that empathy into a motive force for action.\u00a0 For his part, Yamanobe-san has found a great sense of fulfillment in being able to do something he has a true talent for to help others.\u00a0 \u201cYou hear stories sometimes about volunteers burning out because what they are doing is so different from their everyday lives,\u201d he observes.\u00a0 \u201cWhen you\u2019re doing something you love and you\u2019re good at, it makes it easier to keep at it over the long term.\u201d<\/p>\n

Less than an hour after I say farewell to both, I find myself in a bookstore somewhere within the frenetic transit hub of Shinjuku.\u00a0 I\u2019m still thinking about what I\u2019ve learned about the Futaba experience of 3\/11 and its aftermath, when the following book on the new releases shelf catches my eye:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

People of Tokyo, Kanagawa, Saitama, Chiba, Ibaragi, and Gunma!<\/em><\/p>\n

Are you and your family safe?<\/em><\/p>\n

Escape from Kant\u014d!\u00a0 The Serious Moving Manual<\/em><\/p>\n

You should be concerned about the coming great earthquake and radiation!!\u00a0 Where should you escape to??\u00a0 When you do, what about work?? \u00a0Money??\u00a0 A place to live? \u00a0Companies? \u00a0Schools?<\/em><\/p>\n

It strikes me that the people of the towns around Fukushima Daiichi might have appreciated as similar manual, had one been available prior to 3\/11.\u00a0 In light of the continued threat of internal exposure due to the prevalence of hot spots, and the uncertainties about the effects of long term, low dose exposure (to leave the threat of the next Great Kant\u014d Earthquake aside), I can\u2019t say I\u2019m unsympathetic.\u00a0 Still, something about this strikes me as almost farcical, in light of the involuntary, sudden, and seemingly final dislocation forced upon the people of the communities immediately surrounding Fukushima Daiichi.<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t flip through the book since I had to run to catch my train, but I can\u2019t help but wonder whether it recommends any of the hisaichi <\/em>areas up north as possible places of refuge from the next \u201cBig One to hit Tokyo.\u201d\u00a0 My guess is no.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Protest is one logical reaction to the Fukushima disaster, especially in the face of a government that doesn\u2019t seem particularly concerned with preventing similar disasters in the future.\u00a0 For those most directly effected by the meltdowns, though, there is a certain and very real sense in which the anti-nuclear protests and the aims they hope […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":0,"parent":694,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/jbaylis3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/108"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/jbaylis3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/jbaylis3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/jbaylis3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/jbaylis3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/jbaylis3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/108\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":719,"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/jbaylis3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/108\/revisions\/719"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/jbaylis3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/commons.trincoll.edu\/jbaylis3\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}