NOTE: This Observation Column was published March 17 in the Cherokee Tribune and I received two call that day from ex-service men who were serving in Japan at the same time, one on my base at Matsushima, Japan.

Observations©
By Donald S. Conkey

Anyone watching the aftermath of the 9.0 earthquake, followed by many lesser earthquakes, and the 33 foot high tsunami that hit northern Japan last week had to be impressed with just how quickly the destructive, and deadly power of Mother Nature can reduce a peaceful community to matchsticks and debris – and with little if any warning. I was.

Perhaps if I watched this disaster unfold on TV more closely than others it was because I was stationed in Matsushima Japan in 1953 during the Korean War and still remember my two years in Matsushima, the epicenter of this disastrous tsunami. Both Joan (her father was military) and I returned home with numerous mementos and pictures of our days in Japan.

But time takes its toll on memories and memories of long ago often are sent to the storage files of one’s memory base. But like old files these filed memories can be retrieved with the click of a current event that triggers the mind and retrieves those memories from long ago.

As this human disaster unfolded, and continues to unfold, on TV we both reminisced of our days in Japan and how devastating this must be to those living, or were living in those areas of Japan that have now been totally destroyed. These scenes of devastation, both human and property, caused me to ponder on the words of the Lord describing events leading up to His second coming. While rereading his words to Joan about this coming world changing event I was impressed by his choice of words, words that imply this event will be preceded by “the testimony of earthquakes, … and the testimony of the voice of thundering, and the voice of lightings, and the voice of tempests …” and this one grabbed my attention, “and the voice of the waves of the sea heaving themselves beyond their bounds.” These words describe the disaster the coastal areas of Japan are now suffering – with the tsunami waves even crossing the Pacific Ocean and causing destruction on the west coast of America?

I now wonder if anything remains of Matsushima after it took the full force of the tsunami. When I arrived in Matsushima Japan was still in the process of recovering from World War II, a war that had also devastated Japan. Survival was difficult for its people and rice was their staple food and home industries were their primary source of income.

I arrived in Matsushima by train and I was fascinated as I looked out the train window and saw the rice paddies – they were everywhere, even on the side of mountains – all arable land was cultivated. I watched the farmers working their rice paddies – waddling around in bare feet in what looked like a field of mud following an ox pulling a plow while others were planting rice plants by hand. These scenes fascinated me, a farm boy from Michigan.

I was also fascinated by how the farmers thrashed their rice. Some used flails and the wind much as it is recorded in the Bible while others used newer emerging technology, one-man thrashing machines powered by small gasoline engines. Another fascination related to how the Japanese utilized everything in the growing of their rice, even human waste. Fertilizer was unavailable. As we use garbage trucks to pick up our trash today the Japanese in 1953 used horse drawn wagons lined with “honey-buckets” to collect this waste on a daily basis and then dumped it in nearby rice paddies where it was used as fertilizer. This was rural Japan’s way of life in 1953.

This disaster also retrieved another fading memory of a train trip in early 1953 from Matsushima to Kyoto – when Japan’s cherry blossoms were in full bloom – to play in a basketball tournament. It was a breathtaking trip down through the middle of Japan. Like Washington DC’s cherry blossoms, one will never fully appreciate the beauty of Japan’s cherry blossoms until one can see them in full bloom – and I viewed them in full bloom.

This natural disaster, like war, should remind everyone just how fragile and dependent on God mankind really is. Today I can’t even visualize how different Matsushima, a town I once called home must now look. This disaster should remind everyone, believer or non-believer, that disasters, like God, are no respecters of persons – they don’t ask if you’re rich or poor but treat everyone equally.

Millions of Japanese are hurting today and need their neighbor’s help – desperately!