. >> in facing the wave -- "facing the wave," greta ehrlich looked at the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami that hit japan on march 11th, 2011. she spoke at the mechanics institute in san francisco. just under an hour. >> thank you very much for coming here and listening to me in the middle of the warm, beautiful california day. i spend three months in japan after the tsunami. i waited until june to go. i didn't want to be confused with the journalists who were flooding in and out quickly, better to let people settle down, what was left of their lives. in june, september and december it was almost as rich as if it was three different groups of people each time. i will talk about that as i go along. the great seventeenth century japanese, the person in morning is a slave to czar of. nobody i saw in japan was a slave to sorrow. the pain was real and extremely deep as you can imagine. the pain of losing people, not necessarily the pain of losing houses and cars and computers and bicycles because this is a country so seismically dynamic that all the rural people said this has happen