Here in Hiroshima – Joel’s Journeys & Jaunts

When most people hear “Hiroshima,” they probably immediately think of one thing. Maybe I’m just projecting. Nevertheless, despite not being born until more than seven years and four months after August 6, 1945, the atomic bomb that an American plane dropped on Hiroshima that day, killing tens of thousands of people immediately, and well over 100,000 subsequently as a result of radiation and other injuries. The Americans dropped another bomb on Nagasaki three days later, with an even larger eventual death toll.

Many argue that, were it not for the atomic bombs dropped on those cities, World War II would have gone on for much longer, and the additional duration of the war would have killed many more people than the bombs did. I’m not a historian of any sort, the history of World War II included. So, my opinion is worthless. Nevertheless, I’ll give it. As a result of the atomic bombs, the war almost certainly ended sooner than it otherwise would have.

Did the bombings, by shortening the war, result in fewer total deaths than would otherwise have occurred? I haven’t the foggiest idea. And, no matter how confident they may claim to be, I don’t think anyone else is certain either. We can know for sure only what happened on the path taken, not on hypothetical roads not followed. Estimates about the results of hypothetical events are merely guesses. Educated guesses, sure, but still only dguesses.

That being said, it might just be that I’m looking at it through my Western eyes, but there is no doubt in my mind that Japan and the Nazis were the aggressors and villains of the war. Consequently, I think that the Allies’ eventual success in Asia and Europe was an eminently just result. Notwithstanding that, most of the people who died in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were civilians, who had little or nothing to do with fighting the war, and nothing at all to do with starting and commanding it. One can deeply mourn their deaths and vehemently condemn their political and military leaders simultaneously.

This is the second time in my life that I’ve been to Hiroshima. So, I know that there is much more to the city than its history as the first and one of only two cities to have had an atomic bomb dropped on it. Nevertheless, that’s still the preeminent first thought in my mind when I hear “Hiroshima,” or think about the city. I find it hard to believe, and I strongly doubt, that it’s any different for most people, other than possibly those who live their daily lives here.

I arrived in Hiroshima a little before noon today after an approximately one-hour high-speed train ride from Himeji.

I started my visit to Hiroshima by acknowledging the event of August 6, 1945. I went to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park.

Atomic Bomb Dome

My first sight of the afternoon, because it was closer to the streetcar stop I got off at, is not in the park, but across the river from it. It’s an iconic image. You’ve no doubt seen pictures of it. It’s the building that’s now known as the Atomic Bomb Dome or, as a narrative sign at the site refers to it in English, one of four languages on the sign, the A-Bomb Dome.

Much of the building was destroyed in the atomic blast, but there’s more than enough to hold up the iconic dome. After the detonation, all that was left of the dome was its frame.

The sign says that the building was designed by Czech architect Jan Letzel and completed in April 1915.

The sign goes on to explain that, “At 8:15 a.m., August 6, 1945, an American B-29 bomber carried out the world’s first atomic bombing. The bomb exploded approximately 600 meters above and 160 meters southeast of the Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall, ripping through and igniting the building, instantly killing everyone in it.

“Because the blast struck from almost directly above, some of the center walls remained standing, leaving enough of the building and iron frame to be recognizable as a dome.”

Public opinion in Hiroshima was divided about whether to keep the building or demolish it.

“In 1966, the Hiroshima City Council passed a resolution to preserve the A-bomb Dome, which led to a public fundraising campaign to finance the construction work. Donations poured in with wishes for peace from around Japan and overseas, making the first preservation project possible in 1967.”

It has always been an evocative image and a cry for peace even as a photograph. It’s even more so in its presence.

Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park

The Horizons Peace Memorials Park is a peaceful place with plenty of trees turning colour at this time of year. Looking across the river, there’s a poignant view of the Atomic Bomb Dome.

Scattered about the park are a variety of monuments and memorials, and a museum.

There are also several benches. I took advantage of a couple of them to rest and reflect on where I was.

Peace Clock Tower

The first memorial I came upon after entering the park was the Peace Clock Tower. It resembles a tower of twisted vertical metal construction beams with crossbeams at various angles. At the top is a sphere with a clock face on it.

The Peace Clock doesn’t chime on the hour. It chimes only once a day, at 8:15 in the morning, as “its prayer for perpetual peace and appeal to the peoples of the world that the wish be answered promptly may the chime pervade the remotest corners of the earth!” according to a sign beside it.

Bell of Peace

The next memorial I came to in the Hiroshima Peace Memorial was the Bell of Peace. It’s a large, ceremonial bell hanging from a concrete dome resting on four cylindrical pillars. There’s also a large, horizontal pole hanging from the dome that can be swung to ring the deep-throated bell.

The Bell of Peace is dedicated to Hiroshima’s aspiration for the elimination of all nuclear arms and for all nations to live in peace.

The public is free to ring the bell for peace without restriction. I didn’t line up to do that.

Children’s Peace Monument

Further along is the Children’s Peace Monument. It’s a tall statue of a child with arms raised, holding a wireframe representation of an origami crane symbolizing peace. What makes the statue particularly tall is that it stands on a tall, curved, three-legged concrete pedestal.

I’ll have more to say about the history of the Children’s Peace Monument when I talk about the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum below.

Atomic Bomb Memorial Mound

There is a mound of earth in the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park. It’s surrounded by a circle of consistently light-grey gravel. Outside the low picket fence protecting it, there’s a simple prayer area.

A sign by the mound explains, “In July 1955, as a part of the tenth anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb, the present memorial mound was constructed with an underground cinerarium through the leadership of the City of Hiroshima. The ashes of victims excavated around the city were placed here.”

Hiroshima Victims Memorial Cenotaph

The Hiroshima Victims Memorial Centotaph is profound. It is a concrete arch with wide sides slightly sloped out from the vertical and a tight arch at the top. If you stand in front of the cenotaph and look directly through the middle of it, you see, lined up in a straight line, a reflecting pool, an eternal Peace Flame, and then off in the distance, the Atomic Bomb Dome.

When I was there, about a half dozen people were lined up orderly to take their turn at the one perfect position to take that picture. If they were so inclined, after snapping their shot, they walked forward to as close as the public is allowed, where there is a prayer position. There, they bowed their head, said, I assume, a prayer, and dropped coins into a slotted-top collection box like the ones I’ve seen at temples in Japan.

A couple of other Westerners who were there took their picture and left, without advancing to the prayer area.

I waited for my turn, took my picture, but then I advanced to the prayer position. I didn’t say a prayer, but I did respectfully bow my head and drop in some coins.

I passed by the cenotaph again after I left the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. There were then dozens of people waiting their turn to take their position in front of the cenotaph.

Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall for the Atomic Bomb Victims

The Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall for the Atomic Bomb Victims is solemn and moving.

Inside, a hallway circles slowly downward. Its wall has small square niches cut into it at regular intervals. There are some signs on frosted glass along the way. One said that it’s estimated that there were 140,000 deaths from the bomb, either immediately or subsequently succumbing to their injuries. However, the sign says that no one knows the exact number because the bomb that destroyed the city also incinerated the city’s records.

(I’ll jump ahead here. I learned later at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum that the estimate of 140,000 isn’t all of the deaths in Hiroshima from the bomb. It’s an estimate of only the people who died by the end of 1945, whether directly from the blast or from their injuries or radiation sickness. However, after a number of years (sometimes a small number), many people developed cancers as a result of their radiation exposure and died later from those cancers.)

At the bottom of the circular ramp is the memorial hall. It’s a circular room with a gentle fountain at its centre. In the centre of the fountain, there is a slightly conical stone base with a sheared-off top. Above that stone base, the conical shape continues upward, still sheared off at the top. But the upper section has a pie slice cut out on one side. The slice marks the positions of a clock’s hands at 8:15.

The water in the fountain burbles around that conical shape.

The walls of the circular room are decorated with small rectangular tiles. Tiles that use only a few different subtle colours, one colour per tile, decorate the lower portion of the wall. Japanese characters are on a small number of these tiles. I don’t know what they say.

The upper portion of the wall displays a mural of Hiroshima after the blast, rendered in tiles.

To commemorate the victims who died, there are 140,000 tiles in the room.

After leaving the circular commemoration hall, just before the building exit, there is a small theatre. It played a video that told the individual stories of a few of the victims, some who survived, but lost loved ones; some who died not long after the blast, but lived long enough to record their stories or had their stories related by loved ones who survived.

Some survivors lived a long life after the bomb dropped. In the video, there were a couple of elderly women who were children when the bomb dropped. They related their experiences themselves in the video. The audio of the video was in Japanese, but there were English subtitles throughout. I don’t know when the video was made. If they’re still alive, they’d have to be quite old now.

It’s a looping video. I came in after it started. I stayed for a few minutes, but not until the end. I found it too difficult to watch. I’m not proud of that. I would have liked to have borne witness. But it was too much for me.

Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum

Past the ticket counter of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, an escalator took me up to the start of the exhibits. The first part has two rooms. In the first one, there is a photographic mural of Hiroshima before the fateful day. In the next room, there’s another photographic mural of the same location, but after the bomb. As the Atomic Bomb Dome shows, destruction wasn’t total, but close to it. Most other buildings didn’t fare as well.

This section also contained some torn or burned clothing that had been worn by people far enough away from the hypocentre that they and their wearers weren’t incinerated.

(I wasn’t familiar with the term “hypocentre” or “hypocenter” for Americans. I probably saw it when I was in the museum seven years ago, but if so, I forgot. I looked it up in the dictionary and one of the definitions is, “the point on the earth’s surface directly above or below an exploding nuclear bomb.”)

This section also contained some metal and debris that had been fused by the blast and a bicycle that had been mangled by it.

The exhibits continue in a long, narrow building that I could see from the outside is raised one floor above the ground on pillars. The exhibits occupy only one half of this long building. An unbroken, opaque wall divides the building in two along its length. There were no windows on this side of the building.

There is a trigger warning before the start of this section saying that the images may be disturbing. The images were disturbing. There were photographs of the destruction caused by the bomb. One was taken only about two kilometres from the hypocentre, just a couple of hours after the blast. A caption quoted the photographer as saying that it took him twenty minutes before he could bring himself to trigger the shutter. Other photographs were taken from about six kilometres away.

Next, there were some much more disturbing pictures. There were photographs of horrible injuries. There were paintings of the horrendous scenes from that day. There was a brief video, taken from a film from that time, of someone being treated for their injuries.

Following that, there were short textual vignettes of some of the victims—some who were never found, some who survived for a short while and then perished, and some who survived a little longer. Each vignette was accompanied by a picture of the person from some time before the bomb dropped. And, where available, there was a personal item associated with the victim. For example, there was a tea kettle for one, and articles of clothing for others.

There was also a series of panels discussing one child—her life before the bomb, her experience during the blast, and her life of only a few years afterwards. Above, I promised to tell you a bit about the history of the Children’s Peace Monument. Here it comes.

That child was Sadako Sasaki. She was two when the bomb dropped, born on January 7, 1943. When she reached sixth grade, she developed leukemia as a result of her radiation poisoning. Her condition worsened quickly. On October 25, 1955, more than ten years after the nuclear explosion, she died.

Sadako’s former classmates decided they wanted to raise money for a special gravestone or monument. The campaign was successful. On May 5, 1958, the Children’s Peace Monument was unveiled.

In this section, there was a set of two short stone steps that used to be at the front of a bank. At the time of the blast, someone must have sat down on the steps. He was incinerated, but the soot left an image that looks like his shadow on the steps.

After the series of vignettes, the route through the museum doubled back along the other half of the long building. There are no exhibits there, but the outer wall is floor-to-ceiling windows. The view looks out on two side-by-side lawns. Beyond that is the Hiroshima Victims Memorial Cenotaph, and then all of the other monuments and the Atomic Bomb Dome I mentioned above in the line back from the cenotaph.

There were two more exhibit areas past that hallway. The first discussed the Manhattan Project that developed the bomb, the testing of the bomb, and the decision process that chose the targets. In this area, there were also presentations on further nuclear development and testing by the United States and other countries after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the efforts over the years to eliminate nuclear weapons.

One panel in this section said, “Various proposals have set clear deadlines for steps toward nuclear abolition. Global Zero, launched in 2008, set forth a 4-phase action plan to abolish nuclear weapons by 2030. Mayors for Peace, launched by Hiroshima and Nagasaki cities, has proposed abolishing all nuclear weapons and eliminating systems of production, delivery, and launch by 2020. At the NPT Review Conference in 2010, a Plan of Action for the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons was proposed by Group of the Non-Aligned States Parties to the NPT [Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty] to abolish nuclear weapons in three phases by 2025.”

It’s now November 17, 2025. Tragically, the world isn’t there yet. Not even close.

The last exhibit in the museum is on the history of Hiroshima, centred on the atomic blast. It discusses the city a few years before the bomb, the devastation of the bomb, the state of the city shortly after the deadly day, and its subsequent redevelopment.

The museum was a very draining experience for me.

If you can absorb the museum and not feel profoundly moved, you don’t need a heart replacement. You need to have one put in to fill the cavity where it should be in the first place.

Let It Begin With Us

Despite it being the second time doing it in my life, I found gazing solemnly at the Atomic Bomb Dome, walking through the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park, visiting its memorials and museum, and reflecting on the horrific event they commemorate to be a heart-rending experience.

In light of that, I have a request of the world and particularly its leaders. If it wouldn’t be too much to ask, could we not do that again, please?

And while we’re at it, let’s end all lesser wars as well. It’s infinitely more than enough already. Furthermore, if we could also end all individual acts of violence, too, that would be super.

When you consider the benefits society would reap—lives lived long, suffering sidestepped, property and prosperity preserved, anxieties avoided, expertise exploited for good rather than evil…—I don’t think that’s too big an ask.

Let there be peace on Earth. I look forward to your prompt, positive response. Thank you very much.