Disaster Prevention Day 防災の日

September 1st

A drill... somewhere in Tokyo.

September 1^st is the anniversary of the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923, which killed about 140,000 people. It’s now “bousai” day – literally disaster prevention day. Today in Ginza, the emergency services are practicing evacuating 5,000 people from their offices, so cancel those shopping plans!

This week, the government released estimates of the death toll from a possible earthquake along the Nankai trough, which runs along Japan from around Shikoku up to Shizuoka. They estimate around 323,000 could die from the quake or tsunami. Most deaths would come from the tsunami, but about half those deaths could be prevented if people evacuate coastal areas within 20 minutes of the quake / tsunami warning. I could be smug and say “well, we live in the middle of flat, boring, safe Saitama, far from the ocean, rivers and mountains” but you never know where you’ll be when an earthquake hits. Also, a big danger in Tokyo will be fires. All those charming downtown neighbourhoods like Asakusa and Yanaka with their narrow alleys and wooden houses are at risk.

A map from Kyodo news of possible impact along the Nankai trough.

All the advice says to agree on a meeting place for you and your family. In most towns, the local elementary school or high school will be the official meeting point, so it’s worth checking how to get there from your house. For people stuck in emergency accommodation last year, they said issues like boredom and the lack of privacy were stressful. A book, an iPod, a Kindle, a pack of cards, solar rechargers for all your gadgets... these might help pass the time.

In Edo times, there was a legend that a giant catfish, or namazu, made earthquakes. If it attacks, beat it with a shamisen!

After the big earthquake last March, I think everyone became aware of the need to prepare and there was a rush on bottled water and long-life food. But it’s been more than a year, and we’re getting complacent again. I decided to take stock of what we had around the house, and what we needed. In the days after the Tohoku disaster, my husband did a big shop for water, retort pack foods like curry and spaghetti sauce, which can be boiled easily, cans of tuna and other meats, those jelly energy drinks, cereal bars and calorie mates. Actually, there was a LOT of curry. He bought what he'd like to eat in an emergency!

We have a big storage space in our kitchen floor, where we’ve put emergency food and water. But checking it today, I found a lot has expired, so, I guess it’s off to the store again. I hate the idea of buying a bunch of food that’ll get wasted, so I think I’ll just keep most of it in regular circulation and replace it as we eat it. We don’t have a disaster “kit” as such, but I can lay my hands on everything pretty quickly.

Some of our stockpile, including hokaron heat packs and wet wipes, instant rice, etc.

Lasts forever, but I haven't tasted it yet.

Shops like Tokyu Hands and Loft have a “disaster” section, where you can get space blankets, flashlights and long-life food. I got some packs of “takikomi gohan”, which can be prepared in the pouch with boiling water. It lasts till 2016, which is good, but I hate to think what it’ll taste like!  If you want to scare yourself, look up bousai goods websites like this: http://jisinbousai.net/ you’ll even find emergency toilets.

At schools, kids get bousai zukin, padded, fireproof hoods.

For a while last year we also kept the bathtub full of water, in case the water supply was cut off. The government recommends storing 3 days worth of food and water. The official Tokyo Metropolitan Government website has a lot of useful info:

http://www.bousai.metro.tokyo.jp/english/index.html

Assuming you survive the main event, the next days and even weeks of empty supermarket shelves may be a challenge.

When I first moved to this house, my MIL had been hoarding toilet paper and rice for years  – I mean, we had more than 30 rolls of tp and 60kg of rice squirelled away around the house. I thought she was mad, until the days after the earthquake. Toilet paper was one of the first things to disappear from supermarket shelves, and there were radiation concerns about a lot of rice, but we were “sitting pretty” as it were. Strangely, it was almost impossible to buy the daily staples of bread, milk and yoghurt – it’s not like you can hoard those items! I heard a lot of the packaging factories were affected by the quake and power cuts, but I think people also went a bit crazy. My husband suggested we buy a jar of “Creap” which is coffee whitener (and sounds too close to “creep” for me), but I’ll take my coffee and tea black, if I have to.

The other challenge is getting home. I’ve read The Hunger Games, so I’m ready for anything! A friend who was in Shibuya during the big quake said she was surprised to see so many girls shopping for shoes, till she realised all those Shibuya gals in their mega platforms needed flat shoes to walk home. I have a pair of  “Butterfly Twist” folding ballet flats in my bag, and they’re really compact. However, the soles are so thin, I got blisters on the soles of my feet after walking for 30 mins. I think I’ll just wear regular flats every day. It’s a good idea to have an energy bar or something in your bag all the time, too. Everyone who has to wear “work shoes” should stash a pair of sneakers in their office drawer. I got a cute reflector to hang off my bag, so cars can see me at night, plus a solar and wind-up powered flashlight and a whistle for my key ring, and a small flashlight that can run for 25 hours straight as a lamp. But the most useful thing I carry is a small map that tells me how to walk home from anywhere in Tokyo. I know, the advice is “stay where you are”, and if you work in an office in the city, they’re supposed to have several days’ worth of food stored. But I don’t work in an office so if possible I’d want to get home (and all the hotels and karaoke rooms were immediately booked out on 3/11).

This map covers all of greater Tokyo, with separate routes to get to Yokohama, Chiba, Saitama etc. It highlights possible dangers along the way like overpasses, walls that might fall over, vending machines and buildings with a lot of glass. It also marks all the convenience stores, toilets, water sources and rest areas. My aim is to walk all the way home. So far, I’ve been pretty slack. I started walking from Sugamo to Akabane, but got a bit bored and hot. When the weather gets cooler I’ll try again! According to the book, it would take me about 8 hours of non-stop walking to get home from central Tokyo. Fun.

So what are you doing to prepare for possible disasters? Given the number of quakes that have been rumbling through the US, New Zealand, Turkey and other places, it seems nowhere is “safe”.