by H. K. Bush
I struggled to my feet once I figured it was safe to do so. Dust and a few pieces of paper were floating down upon me, and I tried some lights, but they weren’t working. My first impulse was to get out of the building, but my rational side told me that it had been an earthquake, and that the worst was over. Of course, I was mistaken about that.
Trembling like a scared kid, I felt as alone on this earth as I ever had. I found some clothes to put on—socks, sneakers, a pair of blue jeans, a T-shirt and sweater. Then I pulled on a hat and coat for the cold winter weather outside. I moved steadily over to the window to look out, and though it was still dark, I could hear sirens and general commotion on the streets fifteen floors below me. I also saw a number of fairly large fires breaking out. But the most horrifying sight was of one of the buildings just a few blocks down from mine. It was buckled right in the middle, and its upper floors had toppled over like a kid’s Lego castle. Gazing around the other nearby streets, I saw other buildings in nearly as ridiculous a state of emergency. In the distance, toward the bay, I noticed the gleaming Sannomiya Hotel, now cracked in half and leaning to one side. Broken windows and bent iron were everywhere. One of the hydrants right below me was gushing water heavenward. Dozens of people began to emerge out of the buildings and into the streets, in varying degrees of winter dress. One man appeared dazed and naked, except for a pair of boxer shorts. A couple of dogs ran by, loose and free, something you never see in urban Japan.
I located my essentials and prepared to get out of the building. The shock of possibly being trapped in another high-rise about to be broken in half was a focusing motivation. I found my wallet, passport, car and apartment keys, my journal, a few toiletries, pharmaceuticals, contact lenses, some underwear, socks, and a couple shirts. I threw it all into my knapsack and took one more look around at the doorway. That’s when I spotted a flashlight, which I grabbed, and then headed instinctively to the elevator.
I actually pushed the down button frantically several times and waited a second or two before realizing it would never come. Duh. I didn’t even know at that time where the stairs were, and the general darkness in the building made locating a stairwell even more challenging. Good thing I had the flashlight. Meanwhile, I could smell something burning. What it was, or where it came from, I could not quite tell, but again it was highly motivating. As I started down the stairwell, it was even darker, and smokier, than my floor was. There were also several other tenants weaving their lonely way down the ten or more flights to the sidewalks. One guy, braver than the rest of us, was checking floors, pounding on doors, though how anyone could have slept through that experience was beyond me. I respected his courage, but continued descending the stairs. Finally I reached the lobby, also choked with thick smoke, and sprinted out the front door.
General chaos greeted me on Minato-dori, the large avenue outside my condo. One ambulance flew by, siren blaring. Debris had fallen off of various buildings into the street, and the ambulance weaved back and forth to miss the larger pieces. One man held a towel to the side of his head and limped by. A younger couple ran by, the mother clutching a newborn while the father carried bags and a stroller. I saw an old lady seated on a bench, clumps of debris in her hair and clinging to her clothing, gently rocking forward and backward, talking to herself, with an eerie smile on her face. At least she had found some kind of peace. Another woman, in a green bathrobe and curlers, with cream on her face, was smoking a cigarette while holding both hands outward, shouting, “Eriko! Eriko!” I also vaguely noticed others, hurrying in all directions as best they could, given the debris, which was everywhere. More dogs wandered by. There were cats cowering in shadows. Sirens wailed near and far. And ever so slowly, the sun rose over Kobe, Japan.
Once I got out to the sidewalk and scanned the nearby surroundings, the scale of the event began to sink in. From the looks of it, the roads were damaged but passable. For a moment I could not think of what to do, where to go. But suddenly, I looked down the street toward an older residential neighborhood and saw a house on fire. And I immediately understood there was only one place to go.
I ran around the corner, stumbling over a huge chunk of concrete, sprinted up the hill a couple blocks to my Nissan, and jumped in. Revving the motor, I headed up into the mountains, where the road looked fairly open, rather than down the hill into the city. I guessed correctly that the quickest way to Sensei’s would also be the road less traveled, and also the one least likely to have debris and human traffic at this desperate hour.
In all, around 5,300 persons were reported to have been killed by the Great Hanshin Earthquake, a 7.2 magnitude temblor that jolted Kobe awake at 5:46:51 a.m., on January 17, 1995. The quake is still the only one measuring over 7-point magnitude on the Richter scale to strike directly in the center of a major urban population area. It was the largest casualty number recorded in Japan since the Great Kanto Earthquake, which occurred on September 1, 1923 in Tokyo, killing 142,807 persons. In 1995, most victims were crushed to death by the collapse of their houses, and/or burned to death by the fires that followed the earthquake. Half of the dead were over the age of sixty. Among the victims, 59 percent were women, and 41 percent were men. About 170,000 houses were destroyed or heavily damaged in Hyogo Prefecture and Osaka Prefecture. Hundreds of office and apartment buildings were also severely damaged, many beyond repair.
On the first day of the earthquake, there were about a million houses without electricity. For over a week afterwards, almost a million had no gas or water service. A large number of reinforced concrete office and residential buildings, including my condominium, were damaged at the middle or top floors. The number of refugees without homes—which should have included me, though I violated the law by squatting in my severely damaged building for over a week after it was officially condemned—was at least 310,000. Many of these refugees were without homes a full two years after the temblor. I heard later that my own building was pulled down several months after the quake, having sustained serious damages beyond repair to the foundation and other important structural elements. It remained a vacant lot until finally rebuilt in 2004, again as a high-rise condominium tower of twenty-two stories. In all, at least 50,000 buildings were destroyed immediately by the quake, and many thousands were later identified as irreparable, and listed for demolition.
Kobe’s city officials attributed the large number of deaths among the elderly to the growing number of younger people living in the suburbs and the fact that many elderly people lived alone in the quake-stricken areas, and the fact that a large number of homes in the area were built before and immediately after World War II. In the Kobe area, most of the old traditional Japanese wooden houses have heavy ceramic tile roofs and clay filling. Designed to resist typhoons, these older houses presented a poor resistance to the devilish forces of an earthquake of such magnitude. Thus did hundreds of elderly Japanese die, crushed to death in their sleep by heavy roofs as another chilly dawn approached.
I knew the back roads leading up into the Rokko Mountains well, having spent many of my countless weekends exploring them with my new car. I began my trek slowly, since the roadways were clotted here and there with debris, fallen poles, and other damaged materials. By the time I hit one of my favorite roads into the park area, most of the debris, and people, had disappeared from view. As so often occurred in my long walks in the mountains, I was pretty much alone—for the moment.
The path I chose led up abruptly into the mountains, switching back several times, then coming out on a long ledge overlooking the city and the bay. It would lead me northeast for several miles to another winding lane, which would lead me back down to Sensei’s neighborhood. What I saw when I came out of the forest and onto the overlook was nothing short of apocalyptic. I rolled down my window and heard dozens of sirens and alarms going off. Occasionally there were shouts in Japanese, or shrieks, that drifted all the way up the slope. Smoke was rising from countless sites, and raging fires dotted the neighborhoods. Many buildi
ngs appeared to be leaning this way and that, and some were simply toppled over. I took a few long moments just to gaze at this surreal scene, and then hurried off for my destination.
Heading back down the mountainside, I entered the area near Sensei’s compound. I had to work my way down, then back up again, where a fair amount of damage littered the streets leading up to his residence. Fires were already going strong all around me. I was edging my way along the final road up to Sensei’s dead-end location, a road that dropped off immediately to my right, when I saw a massive boulder blocking my path. It had evidently been broken off one of the cliffs overhead, and was deposited there as some test of my commitment. I tried maneuvering around it for a minute or two, then realized that it was a lost cause. I was still a quarter mile away from his house, but I had no choice. So I turned the car around and parked it, right there in the middle of the road, its back bumper almost touching the granite slab. Oddly, I put on the caution blinkers. I remembered the flashlight, and had enough good sense to grab it again. Then I headed up the hill.
Before long, I heard a scream from one of the large homes. “Taskette! Tasketteeeeee!” Desperate, lonely calls of “Help!” I hesitated for only a second. I looked into the property, which was partly hidden behind the kind of six-foot stone walls that were popular in the neighborhoods of the wealthy Japanese. A side of the home was caved in, and burning. Heavy roof tiles were scattered across that side of the lawn like a deck of cards. “Taskette!” The call came with much agony. But my decision was nearly immediate—I needed to ignore the call for help. I needed to find Sensei.
Sometimes, even now, fifteen years later, I hear the cries of “Taskette-Taskette!” in my sleep. Yes, I do have regrets. Many regrets.
My first sight of Sensei’s house was similar to the one I saw just moments before: roof tiles were on the ground, and the whole front entranceway of the house was demolished. A single, large crack had actually torn the stone wall in the front of the house like a piece of cardboard, many of the windows were broken out, and a light gray smoke was rising from a few places, but I saw no immediate signs of fire. The crack in the wall was helpful. I didn’t know the code to the gate, so I just stepped through the wall and into the property. An uncanny silence pervaded the complex, though the distant sirens and general melee continued, providing an ambient mood of disaster. I ran up to the front and found it impassable; pieces of wood were literally stuck into the ground like tombstones. I circled around to the side and then to the back of the building where there was similar destruction. The backside had large windows that came down almost entirely to ground level, and both of them were broken out. I looked around for a piece of lumber, and used it to take out what little shards of glass remained, then stepped directly into the darkened room. An eerie silence greeted me, and for the first time, I was in Sensei’s home with my shoes still on.
“Sensei! SENSEI!”
I could barely see what was in the room. I flipped on the flashlight; thankfully, the batteries were fresh and the beam still strong. Furniture, dishes, glassware, books, and unidentifiable debris were everywhere. Large sections of the ceiling had fallen in.
I inched my way through all the destruction, shouting again and again, “Sensei! Are you here?!” Only silence. I went from room to room. It was a large and impressive building, but now it looked like a bomb had gone off in it. I was not used to entering from the back, and I spent a few minutes inspecting the rooms I had never been in. I pointed the light into another room, one that appeared to be a sleeping chamber for a servant. Heaped into one corner were the gruesome remains of a body, covered with plaster and wood. I turned the body enough to see that it was Omori-san, Sensei’s old gardener/chauffeur/companion, with a terrible gash across his face. My amateur examination found that he had no pulse. Then, from elsewhere, I faintly heard a voice: “Yu-san!”
It was weak, but it was Sensei. “Sensei! Where are you?” I released my hold on Omori-san.
Only silence. Then, “I am in our meeting room, Yu-san. Please come.”
His politeness continued even then, I thought. I stepped out of Omori’s room and followed the corridor around to the kitchen area from where I had entered, and then to the long hallway leading to the front door. Screens were tipped backwards and forwards along this hallway, some at forty-five degree angles across it, making it a kind of obstacle course to negotiate. I smelled smoke.
“Sensei, I’m coming!”
I fought through the screens and found the room. I was deeply moved when he called it “our room.” But today, our room was a mess. Like the others, it was topsy-turvy. A priceless Utamaro print was lying on the floor just outside, the glass cracked and the picture penetrated by the side of a screen. The room itself was even worse than the others. Much of the ceiling had collapsed, and the floor was littered with debris. Tables and vases were knocked over, pictures fallen off the walls. I looked in and pointed the flashlight frantically around the room.
“Sensei? Where are you?”
“Here, Yu-san.” I looked toward the voice and saw a futon for sleeping. I could make out the legs of the old man protruding from underneath one corner of a heavy oak bookcase, covered with part of the ceiling. I pointed my flashlight toward the mess and saw that on top of it all was a massive wood beam, the structural strength of the roof, along with even more clutter and debris. The end of the beam was near my feet. I stuck my flashlight in my coat pocket, placed both hands beneath the beam and tried to lift it. It didn’t budge. I rubbed my eyes. It seemed to be getting smokier, and I realized it was surprisingly warm in the room.
I worked my way through the rubble as best I could. My first act was to look him in the eyes. I put the palm of my left hand on his forehead. He was damp and feverish. “Sensei, I’m here. How do you feel? Can you breathe?”
I already knew that there would be no way for a single person to do much good. He was trapped under a ton or two of dead weight, and the miracle was that it had not already killed him. It had to have been at least an hour or more since the quake hit. And yet I was struck by the fact that he looked at me with compassion and even joy. When I think of that moment now—it was odd, yet consoling— Sensei showing compassion for me, being happy to see me, at that moment and under those circumstances. He had his right arm free to move, and first he grasped my left arm, and sort of shook it. Then he mimicked my own movement, and placed it gently on my own forehead. “Ah, Yu-san. You have come back for one more visit, I see.” He actually smiled, but then grimaced in great pain.
“Sensei, don’t try to speak.” I was lost for words. I looked him up and down, flashed the light up toward the ceiling. “I need to go for help. I can get you out of here.”
But he grabbed my arm with his free hand. “No, Yu-san. That is not necessary. We both know.”
Tears welled up in my eyes, but I tried to stay brave. “But Sensei, I need to get you out of here, get you to the hospital.” Though I knew it was not to be. “Where is the pain worst?”
“My stomach, Yu-san.” I tried feebly to feel around underneath the pile for his abdomen. Pulling out my hand, it was coated with rich, warm blood. It was not a massive issue of blood, but just enough, I suspected, to be fatal eventually.
I think, looking back, that we both knew, in that instant, that he would not last much longer. “Stay with me, Yu-san. Let’s have—” he winced again, his face contorting in pain. He took a shallow breath. “Let’s have one last meeting.”
“Meeting?” I was incredulous, but I somehow understood. “About what?”
He seemed to think about my query. “About the words, Yu-san. About all those wonderful letters.” He winced and tried weakly to push the debris off of his chest. “Pound’s haiku. Hemingway’s stories. The words I spent my lifetime collecting. The meetings have always been about the words and the letters, have they not?”
“Yes. Of course … the words, Sensei.”
He tried again, feebly, to move the weight off of his body. I pulled on
it with him. The bookcase shifted, but only slightly. He settled back into his position of fate, lying there on the soiled and bloody futon. “First, I need you to follow some directions. Can you do me this service? Afterwards, we can begin our meeting. By chance, do you have water? My throat is parched.”
“Yes, sensei. Anything.” I ran back out toward the kitchen, located a bottle of water from the now silenced refrigerator; still cold to the touch. Hurrying back, I held it to his lips, and he drank deeply, over half the bottle in one long draught. This revived him considerably.
“Good,” he said, panting. “Thank you. Now I need you to rescue some of my collections. In fact, I want you to have some of them.” More uncomfortable fidgeting beneath the weight. “Can you look into the next room, where I keep many of my things?”
“But Sensei, there’s no time.”
A renewed energy flashed in Sensei’s eyes. “Yes, Yu-san. You will do this. For me.”
I nodded, stood up, and walked out to the hallway, pointing the flashlight and peering into the designated room. The shades were pulled and it was completely dark, and the room was damaged, but navigable. “Yes, Sensei, I can get in OK.” I quickly opened a couple of the shades, which helped.
“Good.” He waited and thought it over. “I want you to open the closet screens.” I did this. “Do you see the safe?”
Of course I did—it was huge, taking up half the closet space, and was almost as tall as I am. The rest of the closet was filled with file cabinets and stacks of those dark green library boxes that were often the focus of our meetings together. I told him that I had access to all of it.
“Good. I want you to open the safe.” He gave me the numbers. On the second try, it clanked open. On top was a large, faded green volume. I took it out and read the gold words on the binding: Leaves of Grass. A first edition of Whitman’s masterpiece, circa 1855, by itself probably worth several hundred thousand dollars or even more, since it contained an inscription by the author. Below it were a number of other books, several file folders, other valuable commodities such as coins and medallions, and several more library boxes. Then Moby-Dick, with Pound’s inscription: “April snow camellia.” There was also a large stash of cash, both yen and dollars, and some jewelry, as well as other documents. I picked up the Whitman and went back into Sensei’s room with it.