Getting down and dirty

 

We literally get down and dirty with the day's assignment. There was a small tsunami which flooded homes a few yards from the coastline. One issue was sand washed under the house and covered the house's foundation. I believe the concern was this would eventually cause problems with mold. The flooring was removed so the frame could be exposed and cleaned as well as allowing us to remove a layer of sand which covered the foundation.

We had to crawl under the house to get to much of the sand. That's Peter working underneath the remaining floorboards. FYI we all took turns doing the crawl.

Once we removed the sand, the support beams for the flooring needed to be wiped down. We also wiped down flooring that was largely intact, but covered with a fine layer of dirt.

The last time Peter was with our team was 2017. He was quite helpful then, since most of our work was visiting the "kasetsu" (temporary housing) residents or doing community outreach, not physically taxing, a different kind of tired (Peter's always been our stealth team member, kids instantly adore him). On this trip, Peter engaged in all of the physical labor asked of him. He also would periodically caution me not to overdo it. I behaved myself...sometimes.

These two homes were right next to each other. One home was deemed safe, the other house was declared unsafe. To reiterate, earthquakes can cause unpredictable damage.

This house was only a few hundred yards from the house we were helping restore.

We've acclimated to our new home-away-from-home, it's a basic two story building which experienced only cosmetic damage. I didn't sleep particularly well, but I did OK with the day's activities, at least I think so. Tonight should be better.

We're getting ready to wrap up our trip. We've a bit more we'd like to share, so please stay tuned.