TOMODACHI Tsunami Relief Volunteer Project

From September 26-29, 2013, ten American students from Ohio University studying in Japan and several Japanese students from Iwate Prefectural University met in Iwate prefecture for for two types of volunteer tsunami relief activities – the Nanohana Project in Otsuchi, and “Mizubora” (Water Volunteerism) Project in Rikuzentakata.

The Nanohana Project seeds rice paddies in Otsuchi that were washed-out by the 3.11 tsunami and are too salty to grow rice at the present time.  The students appeared on September 27 on the evening news for Menkoi TV, Iwate’s largest TV station. Click here to watch the video.

For the Mizubora Project, American and Japanese students delivered  over 800 boxes of water to neighborhoods on the coast of the Hirota Peninsula of Rikuzentakata.  

The purpose of delivering water is not the water itself, but in maintaining the human relationships that have been built over the past two-and-a-half years between Iwate Prefectural University and the local people since the day of the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami in 2011.  

• For more information on this program, read the program description

 

 

This program is funded by TOMODACHI’s Fund for Exchanges through generous contributions from Toyota Motor Corporation, Mitsubishi Corporation, and Hitachi, Ltd.