Hiroshima mon amour
HIROSHIMA, 5 AUGUST 1998: the day before the 53rd anniversary of the world´s first atomic bombing, which levelled the city and killed thousands of innocent men, women and children. Walking from the 15-storey high Sun Route Hotel across from the city´s powerful Peace Museum near the hypocentre marked by the famous A-bomb Dome, one crosses the river. The water is low, exposing the sandy bank below. A crane stands serenely on one leg near the water´s edge. Above, at road level, is a memorial to a school that was flattened on 6 August 1945.
The monument features women in relief on a huge stone slab, and is flanked by an iron pillar that proclaims in Japanese and English, "Let peace prevail on earth". Standing sentinel atop another pillar, is the image of a folded paper crane, outlined in iron.
In Japanese tradition, cranes signify peace, happiness, long life – a symbol that has come to mean "no more nukes". It is said that anyone who folds a thousand paper cranes will get cured – even of cancer. Today, garlands of paper cranes are visible everywhere in the city along with flower bouquets, banners, and placards. One can sense a momentum and urgency in the crowds come to commemorate Hiroshima Day, but there is only frenzy, no anger. Just intense determination of thousands to remember the past and make the future nuclear-free.
I´m running late for the discussion I´m to attend, on the Indian and Pakistan nuclear tests, part of the programme that comprises the 1998 World Conference Against Atomic and Hydrogen Bombs, organised by Gensuikyo (the Japan Council against A&H Bombs, which has strong links to the Japan Communist Party and a highly political agenda). So I carry on, and make my way along the river bank to the venue of the discussion. I love this walk on the mud track along the river, shaded from the intense sunlight by a canopy of leafy trees, the orchestral, insistent hum of cicadas blocking out all other noise in this shady tunnel.