A simple ring gives It is only a simple platinum band engraved with their wedding date and his initials. Yet to Mika Makizawa, it is so much more.
hope to Ehime
Maru victim’s wife
She believes the wedding band
means her husband's body
will soon be foundFamilies told search may last 10 more days
By Leila Fujimori
lfujimori@starbulletin.comThe fact that divers recovered the band, her husband's wedding ring, from the sunken Ehime Maru has given her hope that his body will soon be found, too.
"I believe they will find him for sure," said Makizawa, who wore a matching platinum band on her finger. "The fact that the ring was in the boat, he was in the boat. So I believe they'll find his body."
Her husband, 37-year-old Hiroshi Makizawa, was one of nine people killed Feb. 9 when the Ehime Maru was struck and sunk by a nuclear attack submarine, the USS Greeneville. Makizawa was a teacher at the Uwajima Fisheries High School, students of which trained aboard the Ehime Maru.
Through an interpreter, Mika Makizawa spoke yesterday with the Star-Bulletin at her Honolulu hotel room. She arrived Saturday with her mother, two sisters, an aunt and an uncle from her native Uwajima.
Though the accident occurred eight months ago, the reality of her husband's demise did not sink in until recently, when the ship was brought to shallower waters for the recovery.
"I know there's no hope, but I have to confirm it with my own eyes," Makizawa said. "I'm looking forward to the day when I can hold him and his belongings and his ring."
She received news of the discovery of her husband's ring on her cell phone just before boarding her flight to Hawaii.
"That was on the day I was to leave for Hawaii, so maybe my husband sort of knows all this," she said. "I was very happy. ... It's something he always wore.
"It's something really tiny, so with all the sand, that the divers could possibly find it, I'm very grateful," she added. "I know that this operation is very hard, and I'm quite aware it costs a lot of money to recover the ship, bringing it close to shore. Something as tiny as my husband's ring is easy to overlook, and they did it for me and my husband."
The 37-year-old housewife says she does not want to think about the possibility that her husband's body will not be found.
Thus far, Japanese and Navy divers have recovered six of the nine missing. Five have been identified through dental records, and one set of remains is expected to take a month to identify using DNA testing.
Makizawa said she has not yet told their 4-year-old son, Yuuki, of his father's death. She said the boy still thinks his father is away on a trip in a fishery boat, telling her, "I'm looking forward to Daddy coming home, and I'm going to play with him when he comes back."
When asked how it has been to raise Yuuki, Makizawa lowered her head, overcome by emotion.
"I don't know. He's very, very small. I just have many wishes. I want him to have a kind heart like my husband, be a straightforward person like my husband and strong," she said. "I want him to live not only his life, but live double for my husband, too."
When he grows older, Makizawa said, she will bring her son to Hawaii and explain how wonderful and good everyone was, the people of Hawaii, and how everybody was concerned, as if it was for themselves.
Besides the ring, Makizawa hopes divers will find a miniature toy car he bought for Yuuki in Hawaii.
She described her husband, who also was an only child, as a family man who enjoyed staying home with their son.
"He was an ideal husband," she said, adding that the family had planned a trip to Harmonyland, an amusement park in Kyushu, after he returned from Hawaii.
Losing Hiroshi created a "big hole" in her life and left her "very lonely." Still, Makizawa harbors no bitterness.
"The accident happened and we can't reverse that," Makizawa said, "so I have to live positively and look ahead. Unless I forgive, the person who suffers is me.
"This country is suffering from terrorist attacks, and still they continue to do the work on the recovery, so I'm completely appreciative of that."