The mayor of a small Japanese town is struggling with his own grief as he attempts to rebuild a community torn apart by the tsunami.
Futoshi Toba was elected mayor of Rikuzentakata just a few weeks before one of the most powerful earthquakes on record struck 40 miles off Japan's east coast.
It triggered a massive wave that peaked at 16 metres as it reached Rikuzentakata's harbour.
The few buildings to survive in the town tell a harrowing story. The damage extends to the fourth floor - a five metre-high concrete tsunami barrier lies splintered.
"It was chaos and complete panic," said Mr Toba, of what some scientists have said was a once-in-a-thousand-years disaster.
The 43-year-old recalls how he and his staff at City Hall carried elderly people on their backs to higher ground.
Amateur video taken by a volunteer fireman in Rikuzentakata shows the tsunami surging through the town, lifting houses off their foundations and tearing down power lines. Residents run for their lives, some looking back in disbelief.
Out of a population of just over 20,000, nearly 2,000 are either dead or officially missing.
The town itself is now a wasteland of mud and twisted wreckage. A year after the quake, bulldozers are still clearing away the debris.
One of Mr Toba's most pressing tasks is to rehouse the thousands of locals who lost their homes.
They have already spent several months in cramped, prefabricated huts.
The task is complicated by the decision to rebuild the town on higher ground, safe from any future tsunamis.
But Mr Toba is also coping with his own loss. His wife, Kumi, was killed in the disaster. He is now a single parent to their two boys, aged 11 and 13.
"When they found my wife's body her face was completely black," he said.
"I thought there's no way I can show my children this. I didn't want to destroy their memory of her as a beautiful mother."
He says his own memories of his wife are everywhere.
"Her seat is always empty in the car beside me," he said. "When we eat, we set the table for four. She's always in my mind."
But the mayor believes his grief may have helped him in his sometimes difficult negotiations to breathe life into Rikuzentakata.
Purchasing private land for new homes and getting local politicians to come to consensus hasn't always been easy.
"I'm not mourning by myself," he said.
"We all share the same pain. A lot of people look at me and say, 'He's suffered what we did', which means I get a lot of co-operation as mayor."
His biggest fear, he says, is that people away from the disaster zone will lose interest now that it has been a year since the tsunami.
"We're uncomfortable about asking for money," he said. "But we do want volunteers to come and see what we're doing here. Then they can go away and tell their friends.
"The scariest thing for us is that we'll be forgotten."
Source: http://web.orange.co.uk/article/news/japan_tsunami_painstaking_rebuilding_of_town
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