ISHINOMAKI, Miyagi Prefecture—Days before last year's devastating earthquake and tsunami, Chisato Shito gave her mother a final gift.
ISHINOMAKI, Miyagi Prefecture—Days before last year's devastating earthquake and tsunami, Chisato Shito gave her mother a final gift.
The fifth-grader had gone with her mother and father to a shopping center in Ishinomaki. They were about to return home when Chisato, said, "Wait a minute." She ran back inside one of the stores and returned with a plastic bag. It held a single piece of what is called a "mother leaf" because new leaves multiply from the sprouts that emerge from around the plant.
It was Chisato's birthday present to her mother, Sayomi, 46. Handing it to her, Chisato said, "I want you to raise it, Mom."
Worried she wouldn't be able to take care of the plant, Sayomi at first tried to refuse, but her daughter insisted. Sayomi placed the mother leaf in a plate of water and left it by the front entrance of their home.
A few days later, the quake and tsunami brought destruction to the area. Chisato was among the 80 students and teachers killed at Okawa Elementary School. The bodies of four students have still not been found.
The Shito home escaped damage, but about a month after the tragedy, Sayomi noticed that the leaf her daughter had given her had frozen. However, new sprouts could be seen on the edge of the leaf.
Feeling that it was the one thing she had to protect, Sayomi replaced the water in the plate and managed to save one of the sprouts. Roots grew from that sprout, and in the summer, the plant put out more new sprouts.
Because of the heavy toll at Okawa Elementary School, the education ministry plans to select specialists to begin a safety study from 2013. However, parents of the children who died in the disaster have been continuing with their own study for some time now.
Whenever he has time, Chisato's father, Takahiro, 48, goes to the school, which has not been touched since the disaster. If he sees any visitors, he calls out to them and tells them what happened there.
In October, a teacher from outside Miyagi Prefecture visited the Shito home.
"I hope you will think about school safety so that such a tragedy never happens again," Takahiro said, and gave the teacher a leaf.
A few days later, the teacher sent a letter saying that discussions had begun on how to hand students over to their parents during emergencies.
The Shitos have decided to relate what happened at Okawa Elementary School to other teachers and have them take a leaf back with them. In passing on the need for school safety through this "grass-roots" effort, they hope that one day schools around Japan will have a leaf descended from the one that Chisato first bought.
While natural disasters are bound to happen, lives can be saved if the desire to do so is fostered and spread.
Through their efforts, the Shitos feel they are coming closer to understanding what Chisato meant when she asked her mother to raise the leaf.