A cenotaph for 84 Okawa Primary School students who died or went missing in the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami has been erected at its schoolyard in Ishinomaki, Miyagi Prefecture.
The cenotaph is composed of three sections. The words “love and affection” are carved on the central section, as well as the names of all the victims, while an image of the school building before the quake and the lyrics to the school’s official song are carved on the right and left sections, respectively.
About 200 people, including the parents of children who were lost, attended a memorial service in front of the cenotaph on Sunday. “Twenty-nine months has passed since the earthquake, but many of us still feel we’re not living in reality. Although our emotional scars will never be healed, let’s move forward hand in hand together,” said Kiyokatsu Otsuki, 38, chairman of a group of bereaved families. Otsuki lost his son, a second-grader at the school, in the March 2011 disaster.
Many parents placed flowers in front of the cenotaph while looking at the names of their children. Kazutaka Sato, 46, whose sixth-grade son was killed in the disaster, said with tears in his eyes, “As I looked at every one of the names on the cenotaph, I felt sharply how many people lost their lives.”
Sato added, “While some people say the creation of a cenotaph helps them leave the tragic past behind, it makes me feel intense regret about the lives we might have been able to save.”
Katsura Sato, 48, who lost her sixth-grade daughter, said she told the cenotaph, “I hope you’re nice to each other as good friends and watch over your parents from heaven.” She said she also swore “not to let your deaths go to waste” by never letting the same kind of tragedy happen again.
Tuesday 27 August 2013
http://the-japan-news.com/news/article/0000495880
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