The Hie Shrine in Mobara, Chiba, where the girl was found.
Netizens have been amazed at the story of a 17-year old high school girl, who went missing from her home in Chiba Prefecture, only to be found at a shrine 400m from where she lived.
The girl had been surviving on vegetables she found in a field behind the shrine, and had lost half her body weight over the two and a half months she had been missing, making her only 23kg [approx. 50 lbs].
From Zazak.co.jp:
School Girl Who Went Missing Is Found In Mobara, Chiba After Two And A Half Months; Lost Half Her Body Weight
On September 26, a school girl (17) in the 3rd year of a prefectural high school in Mobara, Chiba, who had been missing since July 11, was found sheltering in a shrine in the city. Although she was unharmed, she had lost a considerable amount of weight since going missing, and appeared to be slightly dehydrated and weak. Prefectural police assume that it is unlikely the girl had been involved in any incidents; but how did the school girl live during the two and a half months since she went missing, through heat waves and typhoons?
The place where the girl was discovered was a shrine that is a mere 400m from her home.
According to police, at around ten past midnight on September 26, a man (70) from the neighbourhood discovered the girl curled up inside the shrine building at the Hie shrine in Honno, Mobara. The man was visiting the shrine to check on the lawns within the shrine complex, which had been mowed on September 22, and when he looked inside the shrine, wondering where the mochi [rice cakes] that had been left as an offering there had gone, he saw the girl curled up inside. She was still in her school uniform, and appeared tired. Her shirt and bag were covered in dirt.
At the Hie shrine, there is only a small boarded room of around 3 jo [approx 4.59 square metres]. It is a secluded place, which “virtually no-one goes to”, according to a local citizen. The girl explained that she was coming and going from the shrine. When locals visited the shrine on September 22 to mow the grass, there was no one else there.
Vegetables grow in a field near the shrine. When an investigator asked the girl “Had you been eating the vegetables from the field?” the girl apparently nodded. Still, it seemed that she had lost more than half her body weight from the time she went missing, when she had weighed 45 kilos.
The girl was hospitalised for observation, and ate some ice cream that her mother brought for her. Prefectural police will wait for the girl to recover before asking for details about the two and half months during which the girl was missing.
Comments from 2ch.net:
名無しさん＠１３周年：
So, basically her motivation for doing this was to diet?
名無しさん＠１３周年：
Wild.
名無しさん＠１３周年：
Nah, arrest her.
名無しさん＠１３周年：
Half her body weight…so she’s 23kg? [approx. 51 pounds]
名無しさん＠１３周年：
Well look at that, you can have a real survival experience, even if it’s not in a jungle or a cave on a remote island.
名無しさん＠１３周年：
If she’s lost half of 45kg, then isn’t she going to be in a state of malnourishment?
名無しさん＠１３周年：[in response to above]
Yup. If she’d put one step wrong then she could have died, right?
I guess she persevered, but she was probably discovered at a time when she was weak and unable to move.
名無しさん＠１３周年：
I’m not really in favour of people having weird doubts about a story like this, but I wonder if she wasn’t being abused at home or something?
I just don’t get why she would stay hidden when she had lost half of her body weight…
名無しさん＠１３周年：
What was the reason that she was so desperate not to go home?
Usually go you go home when you get hungry!
名無しさん＠１３周年：
So glad she was found.
名無しさん＠１３周年：
Can you really survive like this for more than 2 months?
And what’s more, without anyone noticing it?
名無しさん＠１３周年：
Those pigs on social security should look at this girl and reflect on their own lives.
名無しさん＠１３周年：
Hang on a second, she’s been pinching vegetables from someone’s field, she’s a thief! w
名無しさん＠１３周年：
Home….shrine
Food….vegetables from the fields.
So, where did she shit?
名無しさん＠１３周年：[in response to above]
Shit…returned to the fields.
名無しさん＠１３周年：
The missing diet.
名無しさん＠１３周年:
There’s no way she could have spent this year’s fucking hot summer in a shrine.
And she must have had B.O….she’s a woman so there’s various things that can smell.
I really don’t get it.
Someone persuade me that this is true.
名無しさん＠１３周年：
It’s amazing.
If correctly nurtured, she could be a first-class sniper.
名無しさん＠１３周年：
Any longer and she would have become a self-mummified monk in school uniform.
I’m so glad she was found safe.
名無しさん＠１３周年：
The strength of human will.
名無しさん＠１３周年：
What she did was not normal, so I think that she must have had some kind of problem.
Don’t know whether it’s an illness or a handicap or whatever though.
