playing funeral: tsunami stories (III)

The following is an excerpt of a documentary I was recently asked to translate into English:

On the first day back, childcare students from St. Mary's College in Nagoya came to volunteer at the kindergarten.

Their reason for coming so far to this place? They wanted to be with the children who had gone through the experience of the tsunami. What surprised the college students was how the children played during break times: "Pretend Funeral" was a popular game…

"What do you want to play? Funeral? Medicine?"
"Funeral!"
"There wasn't any medicine at Grandma and Grandpa's funeral!"

Eight children from Fuji Kindergarten died in the tsunami. For many people, starting up the school again brought very mixed feelings.

[The head of the kindergarten:] "Should we really go ahead with this after eight of our children died? Part of me thinks we shouldn't. We had about 50 children there, scared to death in the buses… We hadn't done anything at all to provide psychological care for them."
"We have a big responsibility toward the children who lived, who are alive."

It's important to focus on the here and now for the children who lived, who are alive. That's probably what Junko Nakaso, who died while trying to save her children's lives, would have wanted.