Occasional earthquakes and seasonal typhoons are constant nuisances in Japan and we have learned to live with them. We call them “tensai” or natural calamities and matter-of-factly put up with them saying “shikatagai”.

Turn on your TV any time of the day now, you will see nothing but weather report on heat waves or record-breaking floods and landslides down south. Honestly, what is happening along the coasts of the Seto Inland Sea is something beyond shikataganai. Here’s all about it.

Heaviest floods and landslides have claimed hundreds of inhabitants choking to death or buried alive. Warning systems did function but not in a good enough time for people to evacuate. Not a few people have overlooked hazard routines to themselves die or have their close ones die undue death.

A certain dam optioned to drain water off to save its own structure, only to cause flash floods killing/destroying lives and structures downstream. The dam authorities are under fire over the option so taken. Some village officials insist they gave out emergency notices “in time” but the village folk claim not soon enough. Obviously, there is a general air of unpreparedness prevalent both in the minds of the people and the officials in charge.

Further, our overall concept of safeguarding the country against tensai is at stake. A number of well-paved trunk roads are torn apart either by floods or landslides or both – an evidence that our civil engineering is far from satisfactory. River banks are giving away everywhere to prove that out river management has plenty of room for improvement.

That said, Japan is still a land of charms. Its people have wisdom to learn from natural calamities. Look at the way the volunteers are swarming the disaster areas along the Seto Inland Sea; witness how they rush with shovels and obento (lunchbox) to offer desperately needed helping hands.

The ongoing rescue drive will last somewhat longer due to the overall level of tensai this time. The way I look at it, this is perhaps a God-given chance to look back on our overall safety-keeping infrastructure. Damages done by an unheard-of level of landslides teach us where we ought not to live and the way the floods traversed along the coastal lands show us the way the rivers want to flow.

Abnormal weather is no longer abnormal. Japan has come to learn in the hardest way ever how to live with tensai.

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