Hiroshima
Seventy years after, the blast that wiped out the city with winds and temperatures has little signs. Visiting Hiroshima taught me a lot about how, like dreams, melting skin and walking dead are easily forgotten. Why bomb a city, why bomb two, why use an indiscriminate weapon as both a scientific test and means to showcase bravado against the Soviet Union?
Before arriving, I read John Hersey's Hiroshima, the world's first in-depth exposure of the scenes of death and decay in Hiroshima which, in 1946, TIME Magazine ran as the entire issue. Yet, only after listening to Keiko Ogura, an a-bomb survivor, give her testimony, did the scenes Hersey describe take on human flesh. Hauntingly, Keiko was speaking for the dead, those most deserving of a chance to testify, but not able. With both a responsibility and burden to tell the world about her having survived, Keiko's words recounted a history that the traumatized live, that require several lifetimes before being understood by those it did not touch, that despite the self-serving nature of memories, needs retelling. Not many hibakusha are living still. With each year passing their average age increases till they are no longer able to speak. In the face of increasing security measures in the Japanese Parliament, Japan and the world need reminding that in an instant trauma can be imparted on a community that will suffer for generations.
Come to Hiroshima, and come on August 6th.
Before arriving, I read John Hersey's Hiroshima, the world's first in-depth exposure of the scenes of death and decay in Hiroshima which, in 1946, TIME Magazine ran as the entire issue. Yet, only after listening to Keiko Ogura, an a-bomb survivor, give her testimony, did the scenes Hersey describe take on human flesh. Hauntingly, Keiko was speaking for the dead, those most deserving of a chance to testify, but not able. With both a responsibility and burden to tell the world about her having survived, Keiko's words recounted a history that the traumatized live, that require several lifetimes before being understood by those it did not touch, that despite the self-serving nature of memories, needs retelling. Not many hibakusha are living still. With each year passing their average age increases till they are no longer able to speak. In the face of increasing security measures in the Japanese Parliament, Japan and the world need reminding that in an instant trauma can be imparted on a community that will suffer for generations.
Come to Hiroshima, and come on August 6th.