IWAKI, Fukushima Prefecture--Two years after the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami ravaged towns and crippled the reactors at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, resident John Loynes is reassured that he made the right decision in staying put through the worst of times.
IWAKI, Fukushima Prefecture--Two years after the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami ravaged towns and crippled the reactors at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, resident John Loynes is reassured that he made the right decision in staying put through the worst of times.
A year ago, on the first anniversary of the March 11, 2011, disaster, Loynes admitted to an AJW reporter that he had a packed bag ready to flee in the tense days when the crisis at the nuclear plant erupted. But he and his family stayed in their home just outside the exclusion zone around the plant, despite others leaving in droves.
Today, two years later, Loynes 34, an English teacher and the father of two young boys, tells AJW that his family is happier for staying the course.
"Most things have gotten back on track," he says, although anxiety remains under the surface of everyday life.
Happiness, Loynes explains, is finding "that something so catastrophic and long-lasting can happen to an area and yet things can be as good as they are. On a smaller level, my neighbors were sharing food and helping each other in the immediate aftermath. Moving on to a larger scale I see how people and businesses have survived and how the local economy has revived--somewhat."
Loynes is pleased by how quickly Iwaki, located only about 35 kilometers from the Fukushima No. 1 plant, moved to house refugees from the worst-hit areas of the prefecture--its population has actually increased--and by how all its hotels are full of construction crews and technicians brought in for reconstruction work. Then there's the rush of new students at his English language school.
"Enrollment hasn't dropped, but increased," he says. "I imagine it's because there are a lot of parents wanting to give their kids the chance to move away if they want to and give them more opportunities. People are more thoughtful of what's available internationally, rather than in just Iwaki."
In the past year he saw his student base rise from 105 pupils to 160--giving him enough income to pay off the loan he used to acquire the business three years ago. The Englishman has been living in Iwaki for 13 years with his wife, Mieko, and two sons--Dan, 6, and Ray, 4.
On the first anniversary of the disaster, when the AJW first spoke to him, Loynes was adamant that his family stand their ground in Iwaki.
Amid conflicting and often exaggerated reports he found himself called a "fry-jin," a foreigner willingly living in radiation, in contrast to the "fly-jin," a foreigner who fled on a plane. Both are puns on the term "gaijin"--foreigner.
"In some ways I'm even more Japanese than my neighbors, because I do more Japanese things than them," Loynes says. "My in-laws are very traditional--or superstitious if you like, so I end up taking part in many things."
A Buddhist altar sits in his living room, for example; taiko drummers drummed at his wedding; he helps carry the palanquin at the town festival; and he wrestles in the local amateur sumo ring. Loynes and his wife also head the district's PTA.
He has an option open to him that his neighbors don't have: with his British passport, Loynes can always take his family to England's Lakes District where he was raised. Yet after the family returned from a vacation there this past Christmas, they unpacked the emergency luggage and passports they've kept at the ready since the March 11 triple disaster.
"We were all very lucky, and we realize that very much so," Loynes says. "We had a lucky escape and that's why I wanted to stay. I didn't want to take that good fortune and make nothing of it. The city was spared, and we shouldn't abandon it."
Such determinism is the stuff of the Tohoku region temperament, of which Iwaki is part.
"My view is skewed because we live in the Tono district in the city, and in Tono, many people are like my in-laws, they are very practical and down to earth. Another way to put it is that they are stoic," he says.
"They would have been very angry if we left--they would have thought we were overreacting."
To be sure, life has not be easy for Loynes and other residents of Tono. Several families left for Akita Prefecture in the north and semi-tropical Okinawa Prefecture in the south, never to return. But he and his family did not change their decision to stay put.
Others have grown very particular about what they eat, buying only meat and vegetables brought in from outside the prefecture. The Loynes household isn't, but the father worries about his children's earthquake trauma (Tono lies between two faults and is shaken regularly). He is also concerned about his wife's health--as a public school teacher she worked nonstop distributing aid to the school's community on the Iwaki coast, exposing her to far more radiation than himself. To his relief, the most recent tests on his family show that their overall exposure is no higher than those who left the community.
"I've seen lots of different kinds of mothers, one thing that really hit home is how much the temperament of the mother mirrors onto the kids," Loynes says. "Mothers that were panicky after every aftershock, their kids were terrified. Mothers that sat very calm and were collected, their kids were sensible, they were wary but didn't panic."
More than relief, Loynes sees a validation of his commitment to the tainted land shared by many of his young neighbors. At PTA meetings he can't help but notice the number of new mothers and newborns in his town.
"I don't know whether it's just by coincidence but there's a lot more babies this year. I think people have relaxed and are willing to be pregnant and have kids. In the first year there was a lot of anxiety and questioning whether they should move away."
Years down the road, all those babies can only mean more business for the English teacher who decided to stay and who, with his wife, is expecting a third child himself.
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For his story on the first anniversary of the Great East Japan Earthquake, visit (