The Roving Ronin Report

Ishinomaki in Miyagi Prefecture is one of the town that was hit hard by the tsunami which followed the earthquake on March 11, 2011. I was passing thru 5 months afterwards and still the stark grim reminders remain of what happened that day. Later that evening I went to Sendai the capital of Miyagi which had also gotten hit that day. It was the kick-off of their big Tanabata festival which they do with a big fireworks display. It was good to see the people out and about enjoying themselves - they had cancelled some other festivals in previous months. It showed me that the Tohoku area will pull itself through the disaster with their indomitable spirit. Ganebaremasu!

This is a video I made in support of Japan after the earthquake and devastating tsunami which caused much damage and loss of life in northeastern Japan in the Tohoku region. Over a couple of days I got Japanese and foreign-residents to show their support and togetherness in dealing with the aftermath. I included footage of various Japanese festivals to showcase Japanese spirit and strength. Many of the festival clips were taken at events in the Tohoku area. The singing is from the World Cup celebrations this past summer.

Tokyo Decadance that wild melting pot of subcultures hosted its monthly event this March. Normally the March event is to celebrate White Day March 14th which is the opposite of Valentines. On Valentines, girls give boys presents and on White Day the boys return the favor. This year however the day before the originally schedule event there was a massive earthquake 80 kilometers off the northeast coast of Japan which caused destructive tsunamis which wiped out whole towns and caused enormous destruction and loss of life along the northeast coast of the Tohoku region. Tokyo Decadance was postponed for two weeks and renamed White and Yellow. White for the original White Day and Yellow for support of Japan. Yellow is a positive color in Japan. A percent of the party's profit was donated to the Red Cross. There wasn't as many people out as usual events but there was still a good showing. Kaya was there singing a duet. We had great music played by DJs like Rina Nekko, we h...