Yuko Tanno, a supermarket worker who survived the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami in the Tohoku region, says she will definitely move back to her old neighborhood, where she lost her 13-year-old son to the massively high waves.
"The landscape is different from the time right after the quake and tsunami. To me, that makes me feel I am moving somewhere new," Tanno said, looking at the large open space where her house once stood in the seaside community of Yuriage, Miyagi Prefecture, where almost everything was flattened and washed away.
The Yuriage district, located between the prefectural capital of Sendai and the city's airport, has recently seen the commencement of new post-disaster projects, including the construction of roads and dwellings on land raised several meters above sea level.