Saturday, September 1, 2012

Tsunami Relief

I was fortunate enough to spend 5 days at CRASH Japan's Sendai base helping out with tsunami relief.  The main thing we did was to try to provide encouragement to the people living in the temporary housing.  They had had their lives devastated by the tsunami and had lost most if not all of their possessions.  When I asked the CRASH staff if I could bring something with me, they suggested a small gift for about 40 people, such as quilted coasters.  Things like that would brighten up their temporary houses and remind them that they are not forgotten.  What the CRASH staff told us proved to be true - just being there was often the biggest encouragement.

CRASH Japan's website: http://crashjapan.com/

I found some quilted coasters online at http://maplewood-farm.com/  They were kind enough to rush the coasters to me so I could take them with me.  I gave them out when our team went to Soma to help out with an ocarina concert.  The vast majority of attendees were ladies and they loved the coasters.  Here are the pictures of that event.

 Tin welcomed everyone and entertained the kids with his Australian hat, boomerang, and platypus.
 Ocarina

 The ladies spent a lot of time looking through the coasters to make their selection.

















 

1 comment:

Arsenette said...

That's really cool you took time to do that during your vacation.