Tohoku Quake - Day 11

As I haven't been watching too much news while hanging out with friends in Osaka, I haven't been updating this as much either. For the most part though, it seems tensions have finally started to calm down. Despite the fact that there appear to be some radiation showing up in food and water, they have fortunately restored power to reactors 1, 2, 5, & 6; and they should be able to restore power to 3 and 4 (the reactors emitting the most radiation at this point) perhaps on Tuesday. Assuming the pumps and other systems are still functional, this should be a major step in getting the situation under control. Then it's clean up time to figure out how much radiation has contaminated the surrounding area. From a number of reports I've heard so far though, seems the radiation levels are low enough that there should be little to no affect on people, even if 'contaminated' water or w/e is ingested. I feel like I might end up buying water and tea for awhile though, but we'll see.

Also, I heard an elderly woman and her grandchild were rescued yesterday... 9 days after the earthquake and tsunami. Unbelievable. Thank goodness they made it out ok. I believe the story as I heard it on TV was that they were trapped in the kitchen, and therefore had access to food in the fridge.

Anyways, meeting with friends again today, and I may head back to Kanagawa a day early tomorrow. The situation seems to be calming down (other than still having strong aftershocks), and it would be nice to have an extra day to relax at home.