The Telephone of the Wind
In a hillside garden in Japan stands a white phone box with an old phone that isn't connected to anything. People come from all over to call the dead.
What was reported
In 2010, the garden designer Itaru Sasaki set up a white phone booth in his garden in Ōtsuchi, overlooking the Pacific, with a disconnected rotary phone inside. He had lost his cousin and wanted a place to talk to him.
The next year, the 2011 tsunami devastated Ōtsuchi, and many people in the town lost family. They began to come to the booth, and then people from all over Japan, to pick up the phone and speak to those they had lost. Tens of thousands have visited.
Explanations offered
Nobody claims the dead answer. The 'telephone of the wind' is a place to grieve, and it's become well known around the world. Others have built wind phones in other countries since.
- When
- Since 2010
- Where
- Ōtsuchi, Iwate, Japan
- Witnesses
- Thousands of visitors
- Status
- A real place
Famous cases are real, widely reported events. Each file sets out what witnesses said and the explanations that have been offered, without taking a side.
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