When You Wander

One and a half hours to the west of Osaka by Shinkansen (bullet train), you’ll bump into Hiroshima. Known for the historical drop of the atomic bomb by the U.S. during World War II, friends had warned me to prepare for an emotional experience.

Hiroshima is a major city. There is a high population, a major university, and the Carps baseball team is currently one of the best in the league. All this aside, I went there for the history.

Walking through Memorial Peace Park, the pre-bombing city core of Hiroshima, I felt an indescribable sad-calm wash over me.

The park itself was stunning.

The landscape, memorials, and architectural pieces were all clean, well-preserved, and respected. All of that, added with the clear skies of a perfect fall day painted an eerily beautiful picture. And speaking of painting, many people were. They sat in the grass or on park benches, painting everything from statues to leaves swaying in the wind. From the outside, one might have never known what Memorial Peace Park had been 70 years ago. From the inside, one could feel the pain of the past, but also the peace of today.

Memorial Cenotaph. You can see the Peace Flame and A-Bome Dome under the arch.

The arch represents a shelter for the souls of all the victims.

The A-Bomb Dome. This is the closest, partially standing building to the center of the bombing.

I wanted to know more, so we visited two museums in the park. We learned about the true destruction of the atomic bomb. Approximately 140,000 lives were lost by the end of 1945, the year the bomb dropped. It’s estimated that 80,000 people died instantly and thousands of others died within a few days.

Many of these people were junior high school students. JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL. They were working on site projects for school. Many people could not even be identified. To honor those lost, a room was built to recognize them. There are 140,000 blocks, one for each life lost.

Additionally, some of the museum displays focused on the stories of specific people. Whether their deaths were immediate or drawn out over cancerous years, their endings were always the same. It’s just so sad.

There was one story in particular that I had read about before visiting Hiroshima. It’s about a girl named Sadako Sasaki. She was two years old when the bombing took place. She was thrown out of her house window, yet was miraculously found unharmed. She went on to live a normal life until she was 11 years old. Sadako was diagnosed with leukemia and told she only had a year, at most, to live. Confined to the hospital for ongoing treatments, it was there that Sadako was told about the legend of 1,000 paper cranes. The legend states that anyone who folds 1,000 paper cranes will be granted one wish. And so the origami crane making began. There was one major difficulty though. Although she had plenty of free time, paper was in extremely short supply. Sadako had to get creative, many times using medicine wrappers for the cranes. Sadly, Sadako died before reaching her goal. She was only 12 years old. Her story touched Hiroshima, and a few years later, a statue known as the Children’s Peace Monument was built at Memorial Peace Park in her honor.

Behind the statue, you’ll find thousands of paper cranes, many which were folded by Sadako’s classmates, to help finish what she started.

I know it’s the optimist in me speaking here, but god, can’t we just all love one another? That’d just be such a wonderful thing.

“We have known the agony of war. Let us now find the courage, together, to spread peace, and pursue a world without nuclear weapons.” -President Barack Obama

Beyond Memorial Peace Park, I didn’t get to explore Hiroshima as much as I would have liked. Time was of the essence and Nick had a plane to catch the next morning. I’d really like to return down the road. The people have a certain rawness to them. I loved the modern, polished architecture and the easy-going vibe I felt while walking around the city. It not like Osaka at all actually, but I found these differences enticing.

Until next time, Hiroshima, thanks for the 24 hours of simply soaking you in.