© Jim Seida/msnbc.com
Tadashi Onodera in Kesennuma on Monday, June 6, 2011.
I saw Tadashi Onodera from a distance. He was sitting in a field of debris as far as the eye could see in Kesennuma. Hulks of homes, cars, remnants of everyday life jammed the landscape.
Onodera, a 63-year-old fisherman, returned from one year's work at sea on May 26 to a new 'normal.' He comes down here often now, saying he wants to see what's happening. His house is fine, but he pointed to the skeleton of his in-laws blue-colored home in the distance.
"It's extremely frightening," he said of the landscape.
"It's impossible to know what's going to happen with this whole area," he added, noting it was a question of whether the government would buy it from people or if they would be able to build on it.
Onodera, who stood alongside a rice paddy that couldn't be used since it had been swamped by the tsunami and the debris it carried, said he thought the rebuilding would take at least ten years. He said the government had to revive the fishing industry there.
"That's what this whole town lives on ... without that, if they can't bring that back, then there's nothing," he said.
But Onodera said he would not be joining his fellow fishermen.
"I'm finished. I'm 63. ... I've had enough," he said. "
If I had the chance, if it was still here, I'd be out there. I'd love to work."
