I went to Myanmar from June 14th to June 18th. The cyclone which had caused serious damage to the old capital Yangon had been also reported in Japan. But it was temporarily. I was feeling the shortage of the information. So, I encountered a good chance to make a small support to the devastated area.

It took me 3 hours by car and 2 hours by boat from Yangon to one of the villages in the area called Detaya. Even after one and a half months from the disaster, the recovery was still under way. In this area, major production was rice, but many rice fields were catastrophically damaged. The condition was serious enough that were was a lack even of rice for people to eat. So, I gave rice to all of the people in the village to support. I continued scooping and bringing the rice to their wrapping cloth for 3 hours, and this brought terrible muscular pain to me. It was my first time to work for people innocently.

When I left the village, all of the people in the village thanked me with tears in their eyes. I would never forget those people who waved to me till the boat disappear. I found the density of life in this village where no foreigner enters. All of the things were for dear life, the word of thanks, or a handshake. The moment would never come again. I strongly felt that we had to make the encounter with people a deeper one, even in Japan.
As an act in our university, a group called Antinale has been established and it seems that they have a campaign to raise funds. Also, there may be students who join in some volunteer work like NGO, or makes a personal voluntary contribution. Even if the news forgot the disaster, I want to spread the rings of supports in Waseda University.