Helping to rebuild

The documentary, “Beyond the Tsunami with Ken Watanabe”, premiered last Monday on the Discovery Channel and told stories from Kesennuma in northeast Miyagi prefecture.

In this quiet fishing town, one-tenth of the 72,000 residents lost their homes or livelihoods on March 11 last year. Ships hurled by the tsunami still litter the main streets, too large to be moved.

A year on, victims of the disaster continue to live in temporary housing and are struggling to get back on their feet.

Watanabe, 53, fears the world is losing interest in the victims.

“The way they are living, I felt there is a limit to the capacity of the ordinary person. They are struggling here.”

He wants to concentrate on raising awareness of their needs this year through documentaries and other media.

“I discussed it with my agent in Los Angeles. I told him that this year, I want to present pieces to Japan, I just want to work in Japan.

“Probably from next year, I’ll work in Hollywood again.”

Known for roles in such movies as “Inception” with Leonardo DiCaprio and “The Last Samurai” with Tom Cruise, Watanabe put his fame to work after the March 11 disaster.

He set up two websites, Kizuna311, for people to post cheery messages for Japan, and United for Japan, to raise funds.

Celebrities such as John Travolta added their appeals on the United for Japan site, which has raised US$300,000 (Bt9.16 million) so far for the Red Cross and other aid agencies.

Watanabe was born in Niigata prefecture, hundreds of kilometres from tsunami-hit areas such as Miyagi and Iwate prefectures.

However, he has a soft spot for those prefectures, where he filmed the 1980s TV series that made him famous: Japanese broadcaster NHK’s 50-episode samurai drama “Dokuganryu Masamune” (“One-eyed Masamune”), in which he played the title role.

“Beyond the Tsunami with Ken Watanabe” is co-produced by NHK, Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific and Singapore production company Bang Singapore.

The 30-minute documentary kicked off a new series, “Rebuilding Japan”, the last episode of which runs tomorrow at 8pm.

The filmmaker behind the “Photos from the Sea” episode, Hideyuki Tokigawa, 40, was in Phuket when the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami hit. He had to confront his own fears to deal with the topic but bravely documented the efforts of volunteers to restore and return to their owners thousands of photographs that had been swept away by the tsunami.

A brush with death also comes to Watanabe’s mind, when speaking of why he is dedicating so much attention to people in the disaster-hit areas.

He says a 1989 bout with leukaemia – he is now in remission – made him want to reach out to others.

“I cannot have a complete understanding of the feelings of those affected by the tsunami but I can just sit by them and talk to them and rub their backs and cry with them,” he says.

Often, they made him cry in turn. In Miyako city, an 80-year-old fisherman greeted him excitedly amid the wreckage and debris.

The actor recalls: “He said, ‘Please come visit me in 10 years and I’ll have cleaned up by then’.

“That’s what I tell my friends in Tokyo. Rather than providing money, visit the people here, talk to them, have a meal. The people will be really happy.”

 

Sake & seaweed

_ There are two more episodes to air in the “Rebuild Japan” series, tonight and tomorrow at 8 with repeats at 11pm on Discovery Channel.

_ Tonight’s episode is “Brewing Hope”, about a historic sake brewery that aims to keep going in spite of the devastation. Tomorrow it’s “The Seaweed Makers”, about proud nori makers defending their traditional livelihood.