だから僕は信じることを選ぶことにした。
村上さん。へんてこな訳でごめんなさいね。↓
地震が起きた時は、いつも執筆をするホテルの部屋にいた。
ホテルの放送で「このホテルは地震対策をしています。」と聞いて
信じようと思った。実際、ホテルはつぶれなかった。
ある人は、原発の被害はスリーマイル事件より悪いと言うし、
ある人は、チェルノブイリぐらい酷いと言う。
実際、いろんな人がいろんなことを言い、本当の情報は
どれなのか分からない。
地震と津波の影響で、人々は買占めに走り
商店から物がなくなったり、米やガソリンが買いにくくなっている。
アメリカ人の友人は、関西に逃げるように言ってくれた。
東京に残る人は、「仕事があるから。」「お世話する人やペットがいるから。」
など、いろんな理由を言う。
でも、僕は、原発の影響に関しては
専門家たちが言うことを信じてみたいと思う。
東京にいて、ことの最初から最後までこの目で見ていようと思う。
僕は学生のころ、書いたエッセイを思い出した。
「東京には何でもある。希望以外は、、、。」
でも、今、僕は感じている。
地震と津波で多くのいのちが奪われ、多くの家屋が恐ろしい波に奪われても
わたしたち日本人は必ず復興するという希望があると。
わたしたち日本人には何もなくなっても、
断固として復興するのだという希望の種がある。
だから僕は信じることを選ぶことにした。
~~~~~~
2011年3月17日発行
JMM [Japan Mail Media] No.627 Extra-Edition3
http://ryumurakami.jmm.co.jp/
supported by ASAHIネット
■編集部からのお知らせ
編集長のエッセイが、The New York Times に掲載されました。
「Amid Shortages, a Surplus of Hope」
詳細はこちらから。
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/17/opinion/17Murakami.html
JMM [Japan Mail Media] No.627 Extra-Edition3
http://ryumurakami.jmm.co.jp/
supported by ASAHIネット
■編集部からのお知らせ
編集長のエッセイが、The New York Times に掲載されました。
「Amid Shortages, a Surplus of Hope」
詳細はこちらから。
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/17/opinion/17Murakami.html
Amid Shortages, a Surplus of Hope
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/17/opinion/17Murakami.html?_r=1
By RYU MURAKAMI
Published: March 16, 2011
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Yokohama, Japan
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Brian Stauffer
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Times Topic: Japan — Earthquake and Tsunami (2011)
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Op-Ed Contributor: For a Change, Proud to Be Japanese (March 17, 2011)
Room For Debate
What Aid Makes Sense for Japan?
Traditional forms of disaster relief may only hinder recovery efforts. What will work instead?
I SET out from my home in the port city of Yokohama early in the afternoon last Friday, and shortly before 3 p.m. I checked into my hotel in the Shinjuku neighborhood of Tokyo. I usually spend three or four days a week there to write, gather material and take care of other business.
The earthquake hit just as I entered my room. Thinking I might end up trapped beneath rubble, I grabbed a container of water, a carton of cookies and a bottle of brandy and dived beneath the sturdily built writing desk. Now that I think about it, I don’t suppose there would have been time to savor a last taste of brandy if the 30-story hotel had fallen down around me. But taking even this much of a countermeasure kept sheer panic at bay.
Before long an emergency announcement came over the P.A. system: “This hotel is constructed to be absolutely earthquake-proof. There is no danger of the building collapsing. Please do not attempt to leave the hotel.” This was repeated several times. At first I wondered if it was true. Wasn’t the management merely trying to keep people calm?
And it was then that, without really thinking about it, I adopted my fundamental stance toward this disaster: For the present, at least, I would trust the words of people and organizations with better information and more knowledge of the situation than I. I decided to believe the building wouldn’t fall. And it didn’t.
The Japanese are often said to abide faithfully by the rules of the “group” and to be adept at forming cooperative systems in the face of great adversity. That would be hard to deny today. Valiant rescue and relief efforts continue nonstop, and no looting has been reported.
Away from the eyes of the group, however, we also have a tendency to behave egoistically — almost as if in rebellion. And we are experiencing that too: Necessities like rice and water and bread have disappeared from supermarkets and convenience stores. Gas stations are out of fuel. There is panic buying and hoarding. Loyalty to the group is being tested.
At present, though, our greatest concern is the crisis at the nuclear reactors in Fukushima. There is a mass of confused and conflicting information. Some say the situation is worse than Three Mile Island, but not as bad as Chernobyl; others say that winds carrying radioactive iodine are headed for Tokyo, and that everyone should remain indoors and eat lots of kelp, which contains plenty of safe iodine, which helps prevent the absorbtion of the radioactive element. An American friend advised me to flee to western Japan.
Some people are leaving Tokyo, but most remain. “I have to work,” some say. “I have my friends here, and my pets.” Others reason, “Even if it becomes a Chernobyl-class catastrophe, Fukushima is 170 miles from Tokyo.”
My parents are in western Japan, in Kyushu, but I don’t plan to flee there. I want to remain here, side by side with my family and friends and all the victims of the disaster. I want to somehow lend them courage, just as they are lending courage to me.
And, for now, I want to continue the stance I took in my hotel room: I will trust the words of better-informed people and organizations, especially scientists, doctors and engineers whom I read online. Their opinions and judgments do not receive wide news coverage. But the information is objective and accurate, and I trust it more than anything else I hear.
Ten years ago I wrote a novel in which a middle-school student, delivering a speech before Parliament, says: “This country has everything. You can find whatever you want here. The only thing you can’t find is hope.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/17/opinion/17Murakami.html?_r=1
By RYU MURAKAMI
Published: March 16, 2011
Recommend
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Reprints
ShareClose
Digg
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MySpace
Permalink
Yokohama, Japan
Enlarge This Image
Brian Stauffer
Related
Times Topic: Japan — Earthquake and Tsunami (2011)
Related in Opinion
Op-Ed Contributor: For a Change, Proud to Be Japanese (March 17, 2011)
Room For Debate
What Aid Makes Sense for Japan?
Traditional forms of disaster relief may only hinder recovery efforts. What will work instead?
I SET out from my home in the port city of Yokohama early in the afternoon last Friday, and shortly before 3 p.m. I checked into my hotel in the Shinjuku neighborhood of Tokyo. I usually spend three or four days a week there to write, gather material and take care of other business.
The earthquake hit just as I entered my room. Thinking I might end up trapped beneath rubble, I grabbed a container of water, a carton of cookies and a bottle of brandy and dived beneath the sturdily built writing desk. Now that I think about it, I don’t suppose there would have been time to savor a last taste of brandy if the 30-story hotel had fallen down around me. But taking even this much of a countermeasure kept sheer panic at bay.
Before long an emergency announcement came over the P.A. system: “This hotel is constructed to be absolutely earthquake-proof. There is no danger of the building collapsing. Please do not attempt to leave the hotel.” This was repeated several times. At first I wondered if it was true. Wasn’t the management merely trying to keep people calm?
And it was then that, without really thinking about it, I adopted my fundamental stance toward this disaster: For the present, at least, I would trust the words of people and organizations with better information and more knowledge of the situation than I. I decided to believe the building wouldn’t fall. And it didn’t.
The Japanese are often said to abide faithfully by the rules of the “group” and to be adept at forming cooperative systems in the face of great adversity. That would be hard to deny today. Valiant rescue and relief efforts continue nonstop, and no looting has been reported.
Away from the eyes of the group, however, we also have a tendency to behave egoistically — almost as if in rebellion. And we are experiencing that too: Necessities like rice and water and bread have disappeared from supermarkets and convenience stores. Gas stations are out of fuel. There is panic buying and hoarding. Loyalty to the group is being tested.
At present, though, our greatest concern is the crisis at the nuclear reactors in Fukushima. There is a mass of confused and conflicting information. Some say the situation is worse than Three Mile Island, but not as bad as Chernobyl; others say that winds carrying radioactive iodine are headed for Tokyo, and that everyone should remain indoors and eat lots of kelp, which contains plenty of safe iodine, which helps prevent the absorbtion of the radioactive element. An American friend advised me to flee to western Japan.
Some people are leaving Tokyo, but most remain. “I have to work,” some say. “I have my friends here, and my pets.” Others reason, “Even if it becomes a Chernobyl-class catastrophe, Fukushima is 170 miles from Tokyo.”
My parents are in western Japan, in Kyushu, but I don’t plan to flee there. I want to remain here, side by side with my family and friends and all the victims of the disaster. I want to somehow lend them courage, just as they are lending courage to me.
And, for now, I want to continue the stance I took in my hotel room: I will trust the words of better-informed people and organizations, especially scientists, doctors and engineers whom I read online. Their opinions and judgments do not receive wide news coverage. But the information is objective and accurate, and I trust it more than anything else I hear.
Ten years ago I wrote a novel in which a middle-school student, delivering a speech before Parliament, says: “This country has everything. You can find whatever you want here. The only thing you can’t find is hope.”
One might say the opposite today: evacuation centers are facing serious shortages of food, water and medicine; there are shortages of goods and power in the Tokyo area as well. Our way of life is threatened, and the government and utility companies have not responded adequately.
But for all we’ve lost, hope is in fact one thing we Japanese have regained. The great earthquake and tsunami have robbed us of many lives and resources. But we who were so intoxicated with our own prosperity have once again planted the seed of hope. So I choose to believe.
Ryu Murakami is the author of “Popular Hits of the Showa Era.” This article was translated by Ralph F. McCarthy from the Japanese.
A version of this op-ed appeared in print on March 17, 2011, on page A35 of the New York edition.
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