Here’s a word. Bereavement. Or, Bereaved. Bereft.
It’s from the Old English bereafian, meaning ‘to deprive of, take away, seize, rob’.
Robbed. Seized. It happens to everyone.
But you feel it alone.
Shocking loss isn’t to be shared, no matter how hard you try.
- from ‘H is for Hawk’ by Helen Macdonald
Where do we go, to connect with those we have lost?
The Japanese Garden Designer Itaru Sasaki, lost his beloved cousin in 2010. Filled with longing for a way to remain connected to him in this time of deep grieving, he bought an old- fashioned, green- roofed, glass- paneled telephone booth and put it in his garden. While unable to figure out how to speak about his feelings, or to whom- he started sharing them through this telephone. As Mister Sasaki was hoping for the wind to somehow carry his words to his cousin, he named it “Kaze no Denwa”- Telephone of the Wind.
This Telephone of the Wind is situated in Otsuchi, northeastern Japan, on a small and beautiful grassy hilltop, overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Inside, there is a little shelf with a notebook and pen, several small decorations and a black rotary telephone.
The phone has no electricity and it is connected to nowhere.
It does not receive incoming calls.
And it does not ring.
But just because it doesn’t ring, it does not mean that no one is listening…
Just one year after Kaze no Denwa found its’ new home, Japan was struck with threefold disaster: an earthquake, that created a tsunami, which then caused a nuclear meltdown. Approximately 20.000 Japanese people died.
The coastal town of Otsuchi was hit particularly hard, the lives of over 800 residents were lost in the horror of the floods and another 421 people remain missing to this day.
With so many people in the community being bereaved of the ones they loved, Mister Sasaki decided to open his Kaze no Denwa to all, “to offer something for people to connect with those they’ve lost”.
Word began to spread and soon, mourning people from all around the country began arriving at his quiet hilltop…with an estimated 25.000 visitors having found solace here since the disasters.
In 2016, the Japanese public broadcaster NHK created a deeply moving documentary, called “Phone of the Wind: Whispers to Lost Families”. In this film, we get to see and hear some of the people that visit Mister Sasaki’s garden.
Some of them are looking for answers, others just give a quick update on their lives (“Dad, I’ve really gotten into boybands on TV!”), they share their hopes, regrets, longing, concerns or simply their silence.
Some come alone, others with friends or an entire family.
And while some people simply pick up the receiver and begin speaking, others rotate the dial to choose a particular number.
Anything is possible. Because anything works.
In the documentary, a lady who visits to call her lost son, shares:
“I’m so glad I came. Thanks to my friend..
I was able to talk to him a little
I can’t hear him.
It’s just me talking, but…
He heard me, so I can keep living.”
Mister Sasaki says “No matter how hard it is, hope makes life worth living” and he visits the phone booth every day, looking after it and keeping it clean like an altar.
With the passage of time, he has noticed that the messages in the notebooks have changed.
People have slowly begun to accept the passing of their loved ones, now writing notes such as “Please watch over us from heaven.”
And so, as the people of Otsuchi slowly rebuild their town and try to make it more resilient, this little phone booth helps them, to gently heal their hearts as well.
Notes:
The documentary “Phone of the Wind- Whispers to Lost Families” can be watched here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1OVPaGRszU or alternatively, the This American Life podcast did a wonderful segment called “Really long distance” about the booth: https://www.thisamericanlife.org/597/one-last-thing-before-i-go/act-one
Pictures by Alexander McBride Wilson and Kentaro Takahashi
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