Japan’s disaster hits close to home

When a devastating, 9.0 magnitude earthquake ravaged the northeastern coast of Japan and triggered a massive tsunami two weeks ago, junior health administration major Stephanie Klingensmith was exactly 300 miles from where the earthquake hit.

Meanwhile, David Norvell, director of the Department of Sustainability and Energy Management, was in the Tokyo area with two other UCF engineers helping build a power plant for the university.

Back at UCF, 20 Japanese foreign exchange students studying English were waiting anxiously for a phone call, text, Facebook message or tweet — anything to let them know their family and friends were safe.

The damage has left thousands dead or missing and the lack of water, food and electricity has affected millions.

For some UCF students and faculty the incident has hit all too close to home.

Klingensmith and her mother went to Japan over spring break to visit her sister, Amy Perry, in the city of Nagoya in the town of Irigaike Koen. Perry's husband, Justin, is a teacher at a school called ICAN, which teaches students from all over the world English so they can attend U.S. colleges.

Klingensmith was at an aquarium in the Port of Nagoya with Perry and her nephew, Noah, when the ground began to shake and the aquarium tanks looked like they might shatter at any minute.

"The whole place was shaking, the water in the tanks was choppy and then the gate to let the dolphins in and out was ripped off," she said. "Because it was my first earthquake experience I really had no idea what was going on and being in a country where I didn't speak the language made it difficult to really know what to do or what was actually happening. It was a very surreal experience."

It was around this point that Klingensmith and her family felt a culture shock for the first time during their trip.

"What's weird was the Japanese people with us in the aquarium looked confused too because Japan is an island that experiences a lot of small earthquakes. The people tend to just ignore them and carry on with their day, however, this time you could tell there was something very wrong," she said. "I remember being in the subway after we were trying to get back to my sister's house and a young high school boy found out about his parents dying in the earthquake. He was screaming and crying and running around the subway so helpless."

"Culture shock was definitely setting in and my family did not know what was going on or what to do in this situation," she said.

It took Klingensmith three days to get home after a mass panic to evacuate the country. Since two airports were not functioning, everyone trying to evacuate was sent to the airport she would be flying out from.

A heartbreaking experience

"I was only there for 12 days but that was enough to feel heartbroken for the people of Japan. [Japan] was the most extraordinary country I have had the privilege to visit," she said. "The videos can't even capture the damage and the pain these people are going through."

Norvell was in Japan with two other UCF engineers in the city of Yokahama.

He was on the sixth floor of an office building when everything began to tremble. Although he wasn't close to the tsunami, he was near a petrochemical plant when it erupted in flames. The incident was one of the earliest damages reported.

"We were really scared and confused," Norvell said. "When we walked out of the building there was fire all around us on the horizon. We were afraid of a tsunami but didn't want to go back in the building either because the ground was still shaking. It was nothing but confusion and fear."

Transportation was nonexistent and it took three to four hours for Norvell to make it back to his hotel where there was a lobby full of stranded people.

Lucky for Norvell, he was able to leave the country the next day as he had originally planned.

Tough minds in tough times

Amid the chaos and confusion there, Norvell noticed how resilient Japanese people could be in this panic.

"The Japanese people we dealt with were extremely professional and kind," he said. "They put us before themselves to make sure we were safe. They were really good people."

Teruhisa Souma, one of the 20 Japanese foreign exchange students that came to UCF in February to learn English, wasn't sure what going back home would be like. Souma lives with his grandmother in a town called Noda Village in the Iwate prefecture.

"I was speechless when I found out," he said. "I was speechless as I was looking at the videos on YouTube."

Souma couldn't contact any of his family when the earthquake happened. It wasn't until a few days later that he got a call from his mother with the good news that everyone was alright. Iwate was affected by the tsunami, but Souma's grandmother was OK because of the elevation of her house on a hill.

Souma works part time at a convenience store in a train station in Ichikawa. He wasn't sure if he would still have a job when he got back since the train is no longer running.

"I'm still just shocked and nervous to go back," Souma said. "The thing I want to know is which cities are going to have power. I'm also very nervous about the radiation spreading in cities from nuclear power plants. Going back to school will also be hard. All the roads around my university were destroyed. I still want to go back though."

Mami Suzuki, another one of the students, said she was so worried she could barely manage to type an email to her family asking if they were OK.

"I was lucky that I heard back from them that same evening," Suzuki said. "Everyone is OK, but my mom lives in Fukushima and currently can't get out."

Suzuki lives by herself in the Chiba prefecture and was hoping to see her family when she got back. She's not sure now if that will be a possibility.