>> reporter: she used to live here, too, with her six-year-old son. she was left with a loan of about $180,000. she had planned to repay it over 25 years. yonia lost her income. she wanted to rebuild, but if she took out another loan, her monthly payments would double to about $2,000. yonia made some phone calls to see if she could get any help. >> translator: the building where i lived and worked was completely destroyed. i'm left with a debt of 15 million yen. >> reporter: she was referred to another office. people there said they couldn't help her with her problem. still, she learned the japanese government was working on a program to assist people with the double burden of debt. the application procedure would take a long time. she couldn't wait. she needed help right away.

she took the new loan and found a piece of land far from the ocean where she'll live and set up shop. >> translator: i am just taking a big risk. because if i don't do anything, nothing will happen. >> reporter: still, yonia is anxious about whether she'll be able to meet her loan obligations. a double burden after a year full of them. yuri eto, nhk world. >> many survivors share those anxieties. a government survey suggests about 40% of them have difficulty sleeping. and the percentage who say they're depressed is higher than the national average. some survivors feel compelled to help others. nhk world has that story. >> reporter: many friends and

neighbors weren't as fortunate. he is determined to help those who survived. he brings mail to those in need three times a week. the average age of the people he visits? 75. >> translator: i feel that we have to do something for them. after all, we are from the same town. i would be happy if i could cheer up grandpas and grandmas from my hometown. >> reporter: on this day, kino visits a woman whose home was washed away by the tsunami. mito lives in a housing complex provided by the city. she struggles to do the things most people do every day. she's 87, almost completely blind.

>> translator: i'm embarrassed to say this, but i cannot even take a bath without someone's help. >> reporter: hateros lost her family to the tsunami. so she stays inside all day without speaking to anyone. >> translator: sometimes i feel i'm about to go crazy. why is it that i have to live like this at such an advanced age? i'm really sad. >> reporter: kino visit 120 people during their rounds. most of those people live alone. doctors say they are seeing more and more elderly people. psychiatrists are, too. over the past year, five of the survivors have died in temporary housing alone.

>> translator: we're a small group, so there's limits to what we can do. still, we're determined not to let any of the people we're looking after pass away alone. >> reporter: kino says men are particularly vulnerable. many have trouble making new friends. many have difficulty expressing what they feel. many are too proud to ask for help. this man is 72. he also lost his home in the disaster. he says he doesn't feel like doing anything, so he stays in his room and eats alone. he doesn't even have gas to keep it warm. >> translator: i have tons of

problems here, but i guess this is only expected. >> reporter: they lost confidence in themselves after losing their jobs, because of the tsunami, for example. so they shut themselves up in their homes. i want to do something about it, but i'm not able to make a difference. i feel a bit frustrated. >> reporter: kino hears of more and more people every week who need his help. fewer and fewer volunteers have the time. and kino doesn't know how long they can go on. nhk world. >> the group faces a challenge faced by many in the region, a shortage of funds. this woman is in charge of fund raising. we'll be speaking in japanese and providing translation.

>> translator: thank you for joining us. >> translator: thank you for having me. >> translator: we heard the number of volunteers is on the decline. what is the situation on the ground? >> translator: well, first of all, i would like to thank people in the world and japan for their support in the past 12 months. we were able to deliver a total of 190,000 packaged meals. we are grateful for your support. now that one year has passed, many people may think that there are no more needs for volunteers, however, there are much needs here. so i do hope that more people will come. but it seems that the people are reluctant, so we do hope that they will continue to come. at the end of this month, free toll road service and lodging will no longer be available, so we are afraid that less people will be coming to help.

it takes three hours for some of our stuff to come to our office -- staff -- and because of the small number of people, we are reaching our limits. >> translator: it must be hard to give personalized support to the disaster survivors with different needs. what do you think is necessary to make your work sustainable? >> translator: i think our commitment isn't enough. it's going to take decades for us to rebuild, so we need financial resources. we operate three delivery trucks, so we have to pay for the gasoline, for the 50 kilometres to make rounds and also fuel costs. and there are some elderly people who have to drive 15 kilometres just to reach a supermarket, and others who lost their cars have to wait for infrequent bus service. they are really having a hard time. without help and donation, we will not be able to sustain our activities, so please don't forget the affected areas and continued support.

>> thank you. people who live near nuclear plants have their own worries. many of those worries were confirmed when the reactor one building at fukushima exploded. the crises there made debates elsewhere and pushed people across the country to protest. let's go to catherine kobayashi. catherine? >> gene, as i mentioned, 15,000 people packed into this baseball stadium. the rally started two hours ago. we heard one poetry reading by a resident. it was about the determination of the people to continue living here in fukushima even though the land is contaminated by radiation. as you know, gene, protests in japan weren't common before the

nuclear disaster, but now we're seeing many rallies like this. nuclear safety has galvanized public opinion. many people in koriyama and other places are standing up and shouting out. i met one resident who says she hadn't given nuclear power a second thought until one year ago. >> translator: before the nuclear accident, she was busy raising her children, a 12-year-old daughter and 6-year-old son. they spent most of their lives in koriyama. >> translator: i'm embarrassed to say i didn't even know there was a nuclear power plant in fukushima before the accident. >> reporter: what happened on march 11 and the weeks that followed changed her significantly. like thousands of parents across japan, she was afraid of what radiation might do to her

children. her fears prompted her to act. >> translator: i was scared. i wanted to get accurate information in order to protect my kids. >> reporter: she met with other parents in her town and formed a citizens group last june. they now have 30 members. the group's first projects was to make sure their children's school lunches are safe. they convinced their local government to install radiation detection devices at two centers where the food is made. >> translator: i learned nothing will change unless people speak up to the local government. >> she and her group are continuing to speak up. they're using a web site to attract new members. nogachi designed it, even though

before march 11, her computer skills were limited. it's all part of nogachi's transformation. she participated in her first rally last september, and of thousands of people gathered in tokyo calling for the government to phase out nuclear power. nogachi is committed to staying involved for the sake of her children. she regrets not paying attention to politics and nuclear issues before march 11. >> translator: ignorance. that's what led to the construction of nuclear plants. i realized it's wrong to be ignorant. and i'm guilty of having been ignorant. >> reporter: mogachi is here with me now. >> translator: many people turned up at the rally today.

what's your impression? >> translator: it's very encouraging to see so many people with the same thoughts gathering here. for the future of our children, we don't need nuclear power plants with hazardous radiation. i believe this message would move japan to change its course. >> translator: but without nuclear power plants, aren't you concerned about securing electricity? >> here in korea, there are 33 wind-powered generators. if people all over japan share wisdom, i believe we can replace nuclear power with renewable sources of energy. >> thank you very much. gene, what's happening here is happening across the country. protestors have turned out in many cities and towns, including osaka, sudishima and tokyo. gene? >> thank you, catherine.

an nhk helicopter flew over fukushima. the latest shots of this plant that's attracted attention from around the world. more than 3,000 people head inside every day. they're doing their best to undo the damage. the plant's operators already had their hands full that day. after an earthquake, then a tsunami, things were about to get worse. the tremors knocked power lines and then the waves knocked out generators, and that left the plant in a blackout. cooling systems failed. three reactors started heating up, then they melted down. spent fuel rods started to evaporate. buildings blew up in hydrogen explosions. firefighters and members of japan's self-defense forces injected thousands of litres of sea water into the reactors to try to cool them. but they couldn't stop what was going on inside. finally, nine months after the accident, the japanese government announced that workers had brought the plant under control. the operator, tokyo electric power company, says crews are still struggling in that effort. they depend on a makeshift system to cool the reactors.

workers r workers report that pipes have ruptured and radioactive water has leaked out. the water used to cool things down is filling 1,000 storage tanks one by one. the people at tepco say all those tanks will be filled up by this fall. the explosions and the meltdowns damaged many of the systems operators would have used to monitor the plant. so officials at tepco don't really know what's going on inside.

that complicates the job of keeping reactors stable and removing the fuel inside. japanese government officials say it will take up to 40 years to decommission the plant. those hydrogen explosions we talked about shot radioactive substances into the air. the radiation started spreading. the government ordered 88,000 residents around the plant to evacuate. many fled without knowing when or even if they would be able to return home. nhk world has one family's story. >> reporter: she and her family spend their days far from home. her husband, his father and their two children live in an apartment in iwaki city. she and her husband landed jobs. >> translator: i'm just hanging on here. i don't know what my future will

be. >> reporter: himoto lived in tokyo for 16 years. on march 11, everything changed. she and her family jumped in the car the day after and left town. >> translator: i believe that the nuclear plant was 100% safe. i'm so confused and cannot resolve my feelings. >> reporter: she became concerned that her family may have suffered nuclear exposure. she felt they were safe. still, she's had trouble adjusting to her new environment. she doesn't know her new neighbors. they were allowed to visit her home this month, if only for a few hours.

>> translator: i don't want to take her to her home, but still she wants to go. i'll videotape it instead. >> translator: give me the chance to go back once. >> translator: i want to figure out how i feel, then bring our things back here and all the good memories that go along with them. >> reporter: she goes to her home. she wants to show her children what has become of it. her mother and her husband stand by when they open their door. the floor is littered with their belongings. some kind of animal has covered the floors. the old piano was exactly as it was.

the children used to spend hours practicing. the local government also took the piano and brought it back to their apartment. then she showed them what had become of their old place. >> translator: elderly people say they want to return soon, but for me, considering the children's health and our jobs, i cannot even imagine going home. >> reporter: the japanese government hopes people will return home.

but many say what they had is gone. they want to start again somewhere else. nhk world. >> reporter: japanese government officials have drawn up a two-year plant to decontaminate evacuation zones and allow people to return. but the disaster left pockets of high radiation even outside those zones. science and ministry researchers drew a map of how radiation spread. the red, yellow and green areas are areas of high radiation. wind and rain carried the substances beyond the evacuation zone mainly toward the northwest. government leaders say towns outside the lines on the hull are safe and do not need to be evacuated. many residents have decided to leave, anyway. here's that story. >> reporter: she now knows more

about radiation than she could have ever imagined. she reads everything she can. she worries about what she can't see. she has two daughters and a six-year-old son. the numbers in this kindergarten has dropped to a quarter what it was before the disaster. >> translator: they're at the age when they need friends and to spend time outside. they lost both in the past year. >> reporter: the district of fukushima city is located 60 kilometres from the nuclear plant. officials say the city is safe. they hope to clean up all 6,700 homes by the end of the year. residents have measured some locations that suggest an annual exposure of more than 23 decibels.

the government has labeled that unsafe and required that people evacuate. coming to their home last november, it had three times the radiation, and workers decontaminated the school. >> it was the highest in the house. >> so the children stopped using their room. kamata started thinking that leaving town was their only option. her husband is a doctor. he didn't agree. his colleague specialized in radiation and said there's nothing to worry about. his children didn't want to leave, either.

>> translator: it is our job as parents to protect our children. i don't want us to have regrets in the future. >> reporter: finally, they agree that she and the children would leave next month. they are headed to hokaido, far from their home. >> translator: they said the cleaning doesn't do much, so i'm worried about what would happen next year. will they really come back here? the government maintains there is no reason to leave, so there is bigger support for those who want to. >> translator: it would be so much easier if the government would just stay that toddy said we should definitely stay.

she says after one more year, her town will be safe. nhk world. >> fukushima diachi sits on the coast. the explosion spewed radioactive substances into the pacific. then the plant's operator released about 10,000 tons of low-level radioactive water into the ocean. the spread of radiation didn't stop there. researchers say the substances have accumulated on the ocean floor. in some places, the currents have pushed the radiation to gather into hot spots. the researchers discovered some fish are contaminated with high

levels of radioactive hoping to increase that to more than half before the accident at fukushima. the government offered safety tests on those ilgded for regular inspection. utilities have shut down 52 of 54 reactors. the last one will go off. they fear there won't be enough electricity this summer when they need it most. japanese governors will make a final decision on when to

restart the reactors, but it may be tough to convince their counterparts in the municipalities where the reactors are located. local politicians say they can't be sure the reactors are safe, and they know many residents feel the same way. government leaders are expected to decide on their new energy policy by this summer. what happened here in japan reignited the need for nuclear power. we heard from them a little earlier. those who support nuclear power say it's efficient and emits no greenhouse gases. countries around the world are considering it as part of their energy mix. new plants are going up in emerging economies, but governments in some nations, particularly in europe, looked at fukushima as i warning. last year germany, italy and belgium reviewed their energy policy. all of them decided to ban nuclear power. it is now almost 2:46 p.m. in japan, the time when the earthquake struck one year ago. people across the country are about to hold a moment of

silence. prime minister are attending a memorial service here in tokyo. let's go live now to national theatre.

communities in northeast japan spent the last minute doing the same thing, taking time to remember. people there marked the moment in different ways, however. let's go back to minoritakow to find out what happened now. minori? >> reporter: yes, gene. a siren waled at exactly 2:46 p.m. on this hill where i'm standing, we saw many people praying, putting their hands together, looking toward the ocean. the tsunami left many people victims in this town.

and today, the temperature is much warmer than it was last year. there is no snow like it was on march 11 last year, but one survivor said that the sun today gives her hope that the future will be brighter for everyone across the disaster-hit areas. people here are determined to make a better future now that one year has passed. gene? >> all right, thanks, minori. catherine kobayashi at an event. how did people there mark the moment? >> reporter: gene, people are packed into this stadium by the thousands. they were fortunate to get some sunshine today, but certainly they reflected on what they've lost: jobs, homes, friends, >> reporter: gene, people are packed into this stadium by the thousands. they were fortunate to get some sunshine today, but certainly they reflected on what they've lost: jobs, homes, friends, family. nearly everyone has lost some peace of mind. they gather here today to send a strong message to the government about the dangers of nuclear

power. soon they'll be marching through the streets of kodiama to share their message and to draw more people to their cause. gene? >> thanks, catherine. catherine kobayashi reporting from koriyama in fukushima prefecture. what happened one year ago changed so much here in japan. we spent the last hour and the past year reporting on people who experienced these changes and what they've learned. these are the messages of march 11 one year on. for most people in japan, march 11 will stay with them. we'll continue to follow their struggles and their successes here on nhk world, and we hope you'll stay with us. i'm gene. i'm gene. thanks for watching. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com