A month after the Great East Japan Earthquake hit last March, a young girl was pictured playing a trumpet at the remains of her tsunami-swept home to pray for her mother's soul. That young woman is now set to join a nursing school in Fukushima next month.
A month after the Great East Japan Earthquake hit last March, a young girl was pictured playing a trumpet at the remains of her tsunami-swept home to pray for her mother's soul. That young woman is now set to join a nursing school in Fukushima next month.
Ruri Sasaki, 18, a recent graduate of Ofunato Senior High School in Iwate Prefecture, was living in the neighboring city of Rikuzentakata when the disaster struck. A year has passed, and Sasaki will be enrolled at the School of Nursing at Fukushima Medical University starting in April.
On March 27, Sasaki and her 48-year-old father, Takamichi, went shopping to help Ruri prepare for her new life as a college student.
"This mirror is lovely, isn't it?" Sasaki told her father as she checked her hair, permed for the first time and framing her smiling face.
She bought new suits for her college entrance ceremony. She chose a pantsuit, a favorite of her mother, Noriko, who was killed in the tsunami at the age of 43.
Sasaki also lost her grandfather, grandmother, an aunt and a cousin to the tsunami. In April last year, an Asahi Shimbun article carried a photograph of Sasaki performing "Makenaide" (Don't give up), a 1993 hit song by Zard, at the remains of her home.
"I'm fine, so don't worry about me," she said she wanted to tell her loved ones in heaven.
The article opened the way for her invitation to perform on stage during a rebuilding charity concert in Tokyo in May.
The thought of her mother was never far from Sasaki's mind as she devoted more and more time to cramming for college entrance exams. On special occasions, such as her birthday or Christmas, Sasaki would set aside a glass for her mother.
She recalled how her mom used to illuminate rooms with electric lights and gave her hats and watches as presents.
“Please stay with me, if only in my heart,” she would pray.
Studying at the School of Medicine was Sasaki’s initial goal, dating back before the March 11 disaster, but she failed the entrance exam. Her high school advisers persuaded her to apply for the School of Nursing instead.
Sasaki's mother once took her all over the Tohoku region, making the rounds of medical universities.
“It looks like a perfect place to study in a calm environment," the mother and daughter told each other when they checked out the Fukushima Medical University campus.
"It's as if my mother had guided me to come and study here," Sasaki said.
The list of successful applicants was released March 22. Sasaki used her cellphone to snap a picture of the university website carrying her application number and showed the image to her mother's photo.
"We were there together, weren't we?" she felt her mother telling her.
Sasaki said she wants to continue playing the trumpet, a keepsake from her mother and grandmother, who both loved music. "Makenaide" will retain a special place in her repertoire.
"I want to draw on my own painful experiences and hope to become a nurse who can relate to all types of patients," Sasaki said.
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