Interactions between disabled trainees and surrounding people

What was good about living in the shelter? Anything that helped you?

Our trainees were really amazing. Abled people generally can’t help feeling like disabled people are coming from a position of weakness. Unfortunately this is the usual way of thinking.

Our trainees do have difficulties in life because of their illnesses, and so they do have a tendency to sort of hold back.

At that time, I think everyone felt like they had to do something in that situation.

There’s a retirement home called “Shioneso” in Arahama. Some residents of that home evacuated with us, and our trainees helped those people get up to the second floor.

I think there’s something to the idea that you become weak if you go in expecting to be protected. In a situation like a disaster, however, those who can move should do whatever they can do. There were a lot of elderly people in the shelter, so our trainees helped clean for them and carried meals to the 4th floor for elderly people who had trouble walking.

They also took initiative to start fires for everyone, to boil water for babies’ milk and things like that. Our trainees joined in these tasks of wood chopping and fire building, and I am very proud of them.

I think people, myself included, tend to think negatively when they’re feeling down emotionally.

In a situation like a disaster, I think it’s better to take some sort of action yourself so you can see things change a little.

Most of the people staying in the shelters during the day were elderly. The younger generations left the shelters for work in the mornings.

And so the elderly people who stayed at the shelter got bored during the day. Disabled welfare organizations like us have a lot of young trainees, and there are all kinds of things young people can do, not just physical labor.

For example, elderly people normally don’t use cell phones. But in a disaster situation like this, you have to use a cell phone to contact people. Our trainees did what they could by teaching elderly people how to use cell phones.

Normally it might not mean much, but this kind of support is really helpful in a disaster so people can contact their families to make sure they’re okay.

They would ask questions like, “How do you do this?” And “Where is my daughter’s contact information?” So our trainees taught them how to open their contact lists. When these elderly people got phone calls, they didn’t know what button to press to answer, and so we helped them together because we were nearby. This really seemed to be a big help to these elderly people.

These everyday things seem so simple, but I don’t think the volunteer helpers or school teachers at the evacuation center could have done this because they were so busy with general volunteering and management. We were able to help because we were there, spending every day in the same room with these elderly people.