Photo/Illutration Residents offer silent prayers on Feb. 1 at Horyu Elementary and Junior High Schools in Suzu, Ishikawa Prefecture, marking one month after the Noto Peninsula earthquake. (Takuya Tanabe)

Prayers for the deceased were offered across Ishikawa Prefecture on Feb. 1, marking one month since an earthquake, which claimed 240 lives and left thousands displaced, struck the Noto Peninsula.

At Horyu Elementary and Junior High Schools in Suzu, which now shelter about 250 displaced residents, a moment of silence was observed at 4:10 p.m., the exact time the magnitude-7.6 temblor struck on New Year’s Day.

“I miss those people every single day,” said Toshio Ichimachi, 75, who lost his father to the disaster.

Ichimachi was trying to escape with his family of four, when they were caught up in the tsunami. Before he knew it, his father was gone. He finally found his body three days later at a morgue.

Thirteen shop owners from the Wajima Asaichi morning market stood in silent tribute amid the ashes of their once-bustling shopping district, destroyed in a fire sparked by the earthquake.

“Every day, I think about how to rebuild the market,” said Nagatake Tomizu, 55, president of the shop owners’ association. “The market must go on.”

In the neighboring town of Anamizu, resident Mikiko Muroya, 75, joined her hands in prayer for 16 people killed in a landslide caused by the quake.

“I can’t put it into words,” said Muroya, choked with emotion. She lost a dear friend in the landslide who she went on walks with every morning.

The prefecture announced on the same day that the death toll from the disaster had risen by two in Wajima, bringing the total to 240. There were 15 people still missing or unaccounted for.

The earthquake destroyed or damaged 48,000 houses, forcing more than 14,000 people to live in evacuation centers.

Ishikawa Governor Hiroshi Hase said arrangements had been made to relocate evacuees to 1,194 privately owned apartments, 251 public housing units within the prefecture and 247 public housing units outside the prefecture, all free of rent.

(This article was written by Akina Nishi, Hayato Murai and Ko Sendo.)

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