Team of Local Doctors and Nurses Recalls Kobe at Post-Quake Reunion : CityWalk: Medical workers who went to the disaster site in Japan reminisce over a free lunch at Gladstones.

For the first time since they returned from Kobe, the entire group of trauma-care specialists who rushed to the quake-ravaged Japanese city to offer their services was reunited for lunch at Universal CityWalk on Sunday afternoon.

Casually dressed and enjoying the company of their families, 28 members of the medical team who headed to Kobe just days after the Jan. 17 quake dined and reminisced at Gladstones For Fish restaurant, sharing pictures and reliving the dramatic events.

“As soon as we got off the boat, we could see the devastation,” said Chuck Fife, a nurse at Northridge Hospital Medical Center as he shared snapshots with other team members.

“It made you realize how lucky we were here,” Ed Lowder, a Northridge emergency room physician, chimed in.

Although red tape and cultural gaps often restricted their duties to grief sessions and emotional support, the Southern California group of doctors and nurses was persistent in urging Japanese officials to let them practice medicine.

By the trip’s final days, some were able to work in schools converted into refugee stations, where they cleaned, doled out medicine and filed X-rays. Others were able to run their own clinics to treat some of the 310,000 people left homeless by the massive temblor.

“We were there and we let them know that we actually care,” said Fife.

For Lowder, his time in Kobe reminded him of his own earthquake experience. When the Northridge temblor hit, Lowder felt the stress of leaving his family at their damaged Chatsworth home for his job in Northridge.

“We knew the pressure the medical practitioners were under (in Kobe) when they are trying to help others and help their own families,” Lowder said.

The medical team has also had its share of recognition, from the front pages of Japanese newspapers to news programs in Europe. Friends and family have called to say they recognized them in coverage of the Kobe quake.

Team members were given letters of recognition from MCA, which owns CityWalk and adjacent Universal Studios. They also were treated to lunch at Gladstones and invited to use the park for free.

“It has been very nice, “ said Northridge nurse Luz Martinez. “We didn’t expect any of this.”