In pictures: Japan earthquake one year on

Yoshihiro Takahashi, 65, poses with a photo of his wife, Hisako, at his temporary house in Onagawa in Miyagi prefecture, Japan on Feb 15, 2012. Takahashi lost his wife, Hisako, and mother Satoko as well as his house by the massive tsunami hit the northern Japan on March 11, 2011. Photo by Kuni Takahashi

For the survivors, returning to normal has proved as challenging as clearing up the town.

Before the wave, Onagama, in Miyagi Prefecture, was a picturesque fishing settlement of 10,000 people. A year on, nearly 1,000 of its residents are dead or missing after the tsunami.

Returning to the district where his home once stood, Mr Takahashi learned that the Japan Self Defence Forces had found a body. It was that of his 90-year-old mother, Satoko. Three thousand people are still missing across the coastal towns of north-east Ja???

Mr Takahashi recalls urging his wife to head up the hill to safety, but then left her to check on his neighbours. As a community warden he felt it was his duty to ensure those living alone were safe. The little community of more than 100 houses Mr Takaha???

Onagawa today shows the scale of the task of reconstruction. While piles of tangled debris have now been carted away and heaped into vast embankments along a road up hill behind the town, what is left behind is an atmosphere of desolation. Thousands of wr???

Makoto Oka, owner of the Okasei fish shop, a prosperous business once run by his father, had his shop swept away. A year later, Mr Oka is back in business, employing more than 20 people, even if this is less than half the number from before the tsunami.

Proposals have been unveiled to recreate residential areas after four metres of earth have been added to the land and protective walls of trees, enough, it is hoped, to guard against future tsunamis.

Kenji Masaoka, whose two shoe shops were ruined, reopened one last year and the second earlier this month. Despite tens of thousands of dollars worth of damage, the 63-year-old was always determined to get back on his feet. “One reason I decided to work???

A few stores have reopened in prefabricated buildings, with a non-governmental organisation, Peace Boat, supplying volunteer carpenters to create a mini-arcade in an effort to make the shops more appealing, while giving the store owners a little more spac???

Izumi Tsukahara, 20, right, a volunteer of Peace Boat, distributes newspapers to the residents of a temporary housing, Mieko Iwai, 77, left, and Ykiko Utsumi, 77. Volunteers offer information on everything from recipes to how to write memorials for those ???