Kanon Kumagai was pushing herself to the limit in a long-distance race at a school event last November when she "felt" her parents and older sister--who all perished in last year's disaster--egging her on.
Kanon Kumagai was pushing herself to the limit in a long-distance race at a school event last November when she "felt" her parents and older sister--who all perished in last year's disaster--egging her on.
The 8-year-old from Rikuzentakata, Iwate Prefecture, felt no fear of the spirits talking out to her and wrote of the experience in a school notebook she handed to her teacher as part of her classroom activities.
Kanon wrote that she heard her mother say, "Give it your best, my darling."
Her sister cried out, "Run on my behalf as well."
Finally, Kanon heard her father's voice say, "You did not lose to the tsunami, so there is no way you will lose this race. Do your best on behalf of all of us."
In her school essay, Kanon called out to her kin, "I am doing my best, so please cheer me on."
Kanon is by no means the only survivor of last year's Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami to sense the spirit of loved ones who were taken. Many say they feel a spiritual connection, even though their physical presence is gone.
Kanon wrote that she felt elated by the experience, but let down that she is still alone.
Her teacher gave her a good grade for the report.
Until last autumn, Kanon rarely spoke about her loss and never shed tears. Instead, she kept her feelings bottled up.
Her grandmother, Takako, 70, said, "Now she even goes to the toilet to cry out, 'Mom, you baka (fool!), why aren't you here?' She may be slowly accepting their deaths and beginning to express her emotions."
Kanon said if she lived to be 80 she would try to find a way to go back in time to when she was a first-grader at elementary school. That way, she said, her parents in heaven would recognize her and come to get her.
Kanon now occasionally places a photo of her family next to her pillow when she goes to sleep. It's so she never forgets their voices.
In the modern age, tales such as Kanon's may strike some people as rather fanciful. Yet, books have been written on this subject.
Kunio Yanagita (1875-1962), who is considered the father of Japanese folklore studies, is best known for his "Tono Monogatari" (Tales of Tono, a region in Iwate Prefecture). Among the stories is one about a man who encounters his wife after she perished in the tsunami that swallowed up the Sanriku coast of northeastern Honshu during the Meiji Era (1868-1912).
The man, caught up in a vision of his wife, follows her. When he calls out her name, she turns around and smiles.
The tale was set in the former village of Funakoshi, in what is now the town of Yamada.
Fast-forward to last March 11. A 17-year-old high school student who lives in Yamada says she occasionally has visions of people who died in the tsunami near destroyed buildings and roads.
"I know because they are wet," the girl said. "But I am not afraid. I just feel they wanted to meet someone because they died so suddenly."
She added that if she "met" a good friend who was also a victim of the tsunami, she would say, "I will live and smile a lot on your behalf because you were always smiling."
Zuiei Sasaki, 66, the head priest of the Zuinenji temple in Yamada, visited homes in the area in February and March to offer spring prayers for the safety of households.
Sasaki said he often hears children saying that their dead grandfather had paid a visit or that a dead aunt was standing nearby.
Sasaki tells the children, "That is because of the feelings toward each other of those who are still living and those who died. It is because of the warm feelings that you continue to hold."
In the night darkness above tsunami-ravaged Ishinomaki, Miyagi Prefecture, a small red blinking light passes through the sky.
Two brothers lean out of the window from their room and call out, "That is a Self-Defense Forces helicopter," adding, "may they find some of the missing victims."
The room is decorated with clippings of a popular men's singing group as well as drawings by the two boys, Toshihiko Hiratsuka, 13, and his younger brother, Masato, 11.
Until a year ago, they lived with their 73-year-old grandmother, Katsuko, near the ocean in Onagawa.
Toshihiko says, "Grandmother lives in my soul."
Masato rubs his shoulder slowly and says, "Grandmother is here. I cannot see her, but I can feel that she is standing nearby and watching over me."
The two boys were at school when the magnitude-9.0 earthquake and tsunami hit. They went to a gymnasium and waited, but their grandmother never came to get them.
Their aunt, Miyuki Sasaki, 50, managed to reach the gymnasium several days later. At that time, Toshihiko cried, "It is too sad to leave grandma behind."
Miyuki said, "It may be like an aura. For example, during dinner, I get the impression that she is waiting for Toshi and Masato to finish eating. I feel very relieved."
For the family members who are left, grandma's presence is keenly felt.
When the small red light disappeared into the darkness, Toshihiko piped up, "If I could meet grandma, I would tell her how lonely we were."
Masato adds, "I want to meet her just as when she was alive."
(This article was written by Naoko Kawamura and Ryoko Takahashi.)