Taiko Sawadate, 59, nurse, Otsuchi City
When the alarms rang, I had about 20 minutes to evacuate with my mother. We drove even higher than the recommended safe area, so I was sure it was OK. Someone shouted, "It's coming" and I got out to have a look. The waters were upon us. I just about got my mother out of the car, but she tripped over. As I reached out to grab her, the tsunami swept us away. I was sure I was going to die.
It was dark in the water and I was being hit by debris on all sides. At one point, I saw an entire house coming towards me. But the surge forced me forward and suddenly up into the air and on to a slope. At last I could breathe. I really don't know how long I was in the tsunami. The whole thing probably lasted less than a minute.
Some people found me and gave me dry clothes. I dressed my own wounds. About 20 of us evacuated to a house high on one of the slopes. We found six bodies that first day and more on the second, including my mother's. It wasn't far. I wrapped it in the cleanest sheet I could find and put a stone border around it. Then I covered it with a futon, so the crows could not get at it. I said a prayer and left her there. There are so many bodies, the authorities are not sure what to do with them all.
On the second day, a fire broke out on the mountain, and we didn't have much food – just one piece of bread or one rice ball each for the day.
On the third day, the winds turned bitterly cold, so we walked for an hour to a public shelter at a school. When we arrived at Otsuchi, the city was still burning.
I have nothing left. My savings, bank book and ID cards are all washed away.
Eventually I want to move away from the coast. I feel bad about that, as my family have been here for more than five generations. But I'm too frightened to stay.