genbaku atta machi

(the city that met the atomic bomb)

[update + commentary]

This past August 6th was the anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. On a whim, I decided to go visit this past weekend.



As I mentioned before, my journey to Hiroshima started on a whim. Consistent with the general pattern of my life, planning was pretty minimal - just a bullet train ticket, some Japanese friends, and a backpack filled with my usual Nihon daytrip essentials: camera, dictionary, jacket, umbrella, compass, bottle of cold tea, and lots of candy.





After about a two hour train ride, the first stop of my Hiroshima journey was the Itsukushima shrine at Miyajima island, famous along with Amanohashidate as one of three most beautiful views in Japan. The shrine dates back to Heian era of Japan, circa the year 593.

Normally, the gate of the shrine rises out from the ocean water, but it was low morning tide. The view lived up to the hype.





The ubiquitous tool of Asian life, the rice paddle, is said to have originated from Miyajima. It's considered a symbol of the island, and to celebrate the island being named a World Heritage site, a giant paddle was built - the world's largest.

Things became more serious after leaving Miyajima.


.:.


I'm your typical guy. I often view the world through a set of cold facts, figures, history, and trivia. I'm not into touchy-feely romantic comedies, Oprah, dancing, or kissing flowers.

Nevertheless, I say without shame that visiting the Peace Park, Genbaku Dome, and the Peace Museum was an emotional experience. In fact the word "emotional", can't even convey the depth of what I felt.

Spiritual is much closer.

The months proceeding the atomic bombing of Hiroshima had featured the relentless carpet bombing of Japan by Allied Forces. Most of Japan's major cities had already been reduced to rubble, but several cities, including Hiroshima, had been spared...





The reason for the lapse in the bombing of Hiroshima and other major cities, was unbeknownst to Japan, the US government had developed a new weapon of frightening power. Japan had been selected as the target.

The power of this new weapon was largely unknown, so the US military, in order to realistically measure the weapon's capability to damage a target, ordered certain cities to be "spared" - only a largely undamaged city would truly allow the weapon's creators to judge its power.



Preliminary tests of the weapon indicated that nothing in the history of humanity or science could compare with the lethality of this weapon. Though many scientists involved in the bomb's invention argued for a warning, none was given to the city.

On the morning of August 6th, 1945, the sky was clear. Hiroshima's fate was sealed.



At 1,900 feet above the center of Hiroshima, the uranium bomb named "Little Boy", is detonated. The power is equivalent to 15 kilotons of TNT.

The blast levels buildings, crushes stone, and ends lives. In a single instant, 90,000 human lives are extinguished - including large groups of elderly and young children who had been mobilized around the city to dig firelanes and clear debris. Many of their bodies are never recovered.



Some of the people, their clothes in tatters and flesh burned by the severe heat, jump in the river for relief - many drown. Throats parched, others drink the river water, unaware of the invisible poison that is now the irradiated water.

The river waters become filled the floating bodies of the dead.

In the coming hours, days, weeks, and months, those who did not perish immediately in the explosion of the bomb will still die - around 145,000 alone in the year of 1945.

Across the river, I hear someone practicing the shakuhachi (Japanese flute), but besides that, there's no other sound. People walk through the park, all veiled in silence like myself, as if invisible hands enforced some sort of gag order.

I walk slowly along the riverbank, trying to tell myself that I don't hear anything but the sound of the wind, rustling leaves, and the lonely melody of the shakuhachi... that it's only my imagination when I hear the faint sound of the cries of the dead and dying on that day 59 years ago...


.:.




The first monument I see is dedicated to the "Goddess of Peace". Fresh strings of paper cranes hang around it, and there also lots of flowers - probably all from the anniversary celebration.







The wind had already blown some of the cranes off.






The second monument I see is a Childrens' Peace monument, inspired by the story of Sadako Sasaki. Because of one child, the paper crane transformed from a symbol of longevity to a symbol of the universal human yearning for peace.

I'm reminded of the statue in Seattle, near my old university...






The walk to the final monument is long. But as I walk closer, I see the boughs of flowers around it. I see people, young and old, Japanese and non-Japanese gathered in front of it - the Hiroshima Memorial Cenotaph, built in 1952.

Inside the cenotaph's vault is book listing all the names of the people who died because of the bomb. Every year, it is updated and replaced on the anniversary of the bombing. Inscribed in Japanese on the stone coffin under the arch are the words, "Let all the souls here rest in peace; For we shall not repeat the evil."

Some people bow and light incense. Some place flowers or bottles of water. Others just stop and look.

Standing out of the way, I face the arch to close my eyes and say a quiet prayer.


.:.


In the peace museum are various artifacts, models, and documents. The most difficult things to view are the photographs of the victims, especially the pictures of hours just after the bombing. Broken concrete, twisted and blackened corpses, and the faces of the victims - eyes filled tears, mouths open in cries of agony.

There's a perpetual lump in my throat as I meander around. I'm also drawn to a large scale model of the city, before the bomb.



After the bomb. In the bottom center right is the same domed building where the Peace Park is around.






.:.





Nearby, a lighted case held a humble pocket watch whose time had stopped precisely when the bomb was dropped. In the lower lefthand of the poster behind the case, the words of watch's deceased owner:

"A dragonfly flitted in front of me and stopped on a fence. I stood up, took my cap in my hands, and was about to catch the dragonfly when..."

The weight of history seems to crush me, and again, I am reminded of these things:

How small, insignificant, and fortunate, I am.


.:.


Was the bomb necessary? Did the US really have to drop the bomb?

A lot of recent evidence points to the cold-blooded reasons of politics and inhuman scientific curiousity rather than simple military strategy - racist attitudes directed at the Japanese people, the looming US-Soviet rivalry, the huge cost of the atomic project, the relative ignorance of the bomb's effects on human beings.

Japan's military had already been rendered ineffective and Japanese territory reduced to that of the home islands.

Or perhaps did Japan's outright military aggression, it's atrocities in China, Korea and the Pacific, generate an unavoidable, karmic outcome?

People will probably continue to debate both sides for many years to come.

But regardless of scholarly opinions about the matter, there are these simple undeniable facts:

A lot of people died. A lot more people suffered. And a whole generation and entire nation still bears the scars.


.:.


Would there be peace in the world without nuclear weapons, bombs, tanks, and guns? Maybe. Banning weapons may reduce the lethality of war, but the greatest evil is never found in the things that people build with their hands.

No, the greatest evil still is the evil we hold in our hearts, and our own, arrogant, faithless tendency to forget the mistakes we've made...
posted by G at 5:57 AM   |

in?scrip?tion (n-skrip-shun)n.
1. The act or an instance of inscribing.
2. Something, such as the wording on a coin, medal, monument, or seal, that is inscribed.
3. A short, signed message in a book or on a photograph given as a gift.
4. The usually informal dedication of an artistic work.
5. Jeremiah 31:33