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HIROSHIMA

A Visit to the Peace Park and the Peace Memorial Museum

by Dr M Muniruzzaman
***
On 6 August 1945 Hiroshima became the first city in the world to be destroyed by an atomic bomb. Almost the entire city and its inhabitants were wiped out In an Instant. Survivors of the holocaust suffered great physical and mental pain. For many the nightmare still continues. ***
DR Tadashi Nakatsuka and I were, on the second leg of our tour of southern Japan. We boarded the Shinkansen at Shin-Kobe on the morning of 21 April. The ninety minutes journey would take us to Hiroshima, where we would spend the best part of a day visiting the A-bomb dome, the Peace Park and the Peace Memorial Museum. The Hikari Superexpress' on which we were bound for Hiroshima is another testimony to Japan's technological brilliance. Traveling over 200 km per hour the compartments electronically display the velocity of the train, the distance and time of arrival to the nearest station.
It was drizzling when we came out of the Hiroshima railway station. Within a few minutes walking distance is the streetcar station. We boarded the streetcar bound for Miyajima and would get off at Gen-baku Dome-Mae (A-bomb dome) in about 15 minutes. As we took our seats in the car my thoughts wondered off to the many pictures I saw of the devastations of Hiroshima. The first city in the world to be de-
stroyed by an atomic bomb. Much later as a student of Physics. I leamt more about the A-bomb and its awesome power of destruction. I looked out of the window of the streetcar. I could of course see nothing of that destruction now. Hiroshima has been completely reb jilt after the war and today it is like any other Japanese city. Beautiful, well-planned and modern. All that remains of that holocaust are the A-bomb dome, the various monuments and the very well-preserved exhibits inside the Peace Memorial Museum.
The Peace Park and the Peace Memorial Museum are arranged on a triangular piece of land with the A-bomb dome at the northern apex of the triangle. The site is bounded to the east by the Motoyasu River, to the west by the Honkawa River, the West Peace Bridge and the East Peace Bridge and the road connecting them forms the base of the triangle to the south. The northern apex is also the junction of the rivers. As we walked towards the Motoyasu Bridge we visited the Memorial Tower erected in
memory of the students mobilized to help the victims of the A-bomb. We entered the Peace Park through the Motoyasu Bridge. As we passed the northern end of the Park to the south, we passed the Peace Clock Tower, the Peace Bell, the Atomic Bomb Memorial Mound, the Monument in Memory of the Korean Victims of the A-bomb, the Peace Fountain and the Childrens' Peace Monument. All these monuments are simple but elegantly designed and convey the deep emotions and feelings of the people of Hiroshima.
There is a very touching story about the Childrens' Peace Monument. It goes somewhat like this. A little girl was almost dying in a hospital from the effects of nuclear radiation. In order to keep her spirits high it was suggested to her that if she could make a thousand paper cranes she would get well. The little girl made more than a thousand paper cranes from whatever bits of paper she could lay her hands on. She of course never got well, but died after making those paper cranes. The Childrens' Peace Monument commemorates that even. A few paper cranes made by the girl are also on display Inside the Museum.
Walking further south we passed the Peace Fountain the Flame of Peace, the Monument of Prayer and the Hiroshima Peace City Memorial — a cenotaph for the A-bomb victims. Further south and running west-east lay the International Conference Centre and the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. Beyond these are the Fountain of Prayer and on the base of the triangle, the Statue of Mother and Child in the Storm.
We had spent an hour looking at the monuments inside the Park. Before entering the Museum we decided to have some lunch. It was still drizzling. when we came out of the
restaurant, but not as heavily. The Park by now was full of tourists and school children in their uniform, raincoats and their brightly coloured umbrellas. On inquiry Nakatsuka-san informed me the place is always crowded at this time of the year, particularly with school children as their schools are yet to open for the new session.
The first public display of materials related to the atomic bombing took place on September 9. 1949 and began with the establishment of tne A-bomb Memorial Hall in the Hiroshima City Central Public Hall. Subsequently the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Hall and the Peace Memorial Museum were established in the Peace Memorial Park in 1955. The Peace Memorial Museum is divided into two buildings. The fourstoried East Building including a basement displays facts and records of Hiroshima before and after the bombing. The West Building connected to the East Building by a corridor houses possessions of people who died in the bombing, records and other items.
A token 50 yen entrance fee is required to get into the Museum Building. We entered the first floor of the Museum through the eastern entrance. The basement of the building houses the library, meeting and projection rooms, the Peace Memorial Hall and various offices. The entrance of the first floor leads straight onto a large room which houses models of the city before and after the A-bombing and the A-bomb dome. On the walls of the room are pictures of destruction of the city, information on the bomb and messages by the Mayors of Hiroshima, commemorating the Hiroshima Day. The room also houses video theatres of the A-bombing and other information. We didn't have enough time to go through the videos, however we gathered as much information as we could from the
posters on display. We learnt that the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima was about 3 m long, about 0.7 m in diameter and weighed about 4 tons. The destructive power was equivalent to 15.000 tons of TNT. The hypocentre of the bomb was slightly offset to the southeast of the prefectural office building. now displayed as the A-bomb dome. Witness account of the destruction of Hiroshima speak' of "a white flash, at the same instant searing heat and blast whirlwinds".
The second floor houses models of the former City Building, model of the Old Hiroshima Red Cross Hospital and models of the original plans for Peace Memorial Park. It also has a section depicting Hiroshima's role as a key military centre and the people of Hiroshima struggling to rebuild their lives after the bomb. The third floor houses videos on A-bomb and various peace issues as well as a section on Mankind Entering the Nuclear Age. The damage done by the A-bomb was so catastrophic that the 'conviction that humanity cannot coexist with nuclear weapons' — has led to the establishment of the section entitled Hiroshima's Journey to the-Path of Peace.
We entered the West Building "Through' the' connecting corridor. This building has only one level of exhibit. The first room has a huge display — a panorama on the scale of one to one thousand of the completely devastated city. On one side of the room is a diorama with wax figures of atomic bomb victims. This is a very striking display of civilians caught in the full blast of the explosion. The back-Kound in red shows houses on e. people with their clothes burning and skin peeling off their bodies running helter skelter for safety.
The next few rooms exhibit the damage by the heat rays, the blast, radiation and fire. It also shows the relief and rescue operation geared up to meet the crisis. Recorded testimony of the atomic bomb survivors (in Japanese) form a vivid complement to the items on display. At the moment of the explosion, the fireball created reached a diameter of more than 200 m tn the space of 0.3 s. The whole area within a radius of 2 km from the hypocentre was completely Incinerated and the heat generated caused bums to people up to a radius of 3.5 km. On display in these rooms are persona] possessions like burnt remains of school uniform, shoes, tiffin boxes — some with
charred remains of the contents. specties with their steel frames discoloured and glasses melted out, bicycles turned into burnt metal, skins and nails that peeled off from the victims' body. Display of domestic items like burnt and disfigured bread toasters, cooking utensils, glass bottles partially melted and fused together — all testify to the inferno created by the explosion. Another remarkable display is that of the shadow of a person sitting on stone steps and leaning against a wall. The portion covered by the victims body had retained the original colour of the stone, but the exposed area had turned into an ash colour. A brick wall with numerous glass splinters embedded in it testify to the velocity of the flying glasses. The short and long term effects of nuclear radiation on the civilian population has also been well documented and photographed. It said people within 1 km of the hypocentre received lifethreatening doses, many of whom died within a few days. Apart from the immediate effects there were disorders that arose over a long period of time following exposure. Disorders such as leukemia and cancer appealed even ten years after victims were exposed to radia-‘K,. ^^...od : a . :
The disaster caused by the atomic bomb struck the whole city in an Instant. All public offices. including the prefecture office the city office, the police station and the fire brigade were completely inactivated. Despite the contusion that followed the surrender and occupation. the people of Hiroshima rebuilding tneir lives in the face of the most adverse circum-stances form the subject matter of the relief and rescue activities.
N.ikatsuka-san and 1 had been inside the Museum close to three hours and were now at the end of the display. We decided to call it a day and walked out of the exhibition room and into the lobby and sat down at the place of reflection. I closed my ey es and remembered a line of message on the entrance to the Museum "Hiroshima is a city which continually seeks peace'. I thought I understood what that sentence really means. After writing my comments In the Book of Messages for Peace, we walked out of the Museum and into the drizzle.
The author ts Professor of Physics and Former Dean of the Faculty of Mathematical and Physical Sciences. Jahanalma gar University. Savor, Dhaka.