Friday 9 August 2013

Remembering Hiroshima and Nagasaki

Hi Everybody,
This is Amaya and Yoko.  As you know we are half Japanese.  On august 6th and august 9th 1945 atomic bombs were dropped on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki killing many people and causing long term suffering to many, many more.
We feel that it is important to remember bad things that happened as well as good things so that we can be sure they don't ever happen again.
There is a memorial park in Hiroshima
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiroshima_Peace_Memorial_Park


The symbol for peace and wishes coming true is the origami crane.  There is a legend that if you fold 1000 cranes your wish will come true.  There is a children's book about a little girl called sadako that deals with radiation sickness and folding cranes.  The tradition is that if a person makes 1000 cranes in one year their wish will come true.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadako_and_the_Thousand_Paper_Cranes
There is a statue of Sadako in the Hiroshima peace park.

Here are some photos we took today.  Our guardian's oldest brother made a LOT of paper cranes more than 10 years ago for a project that he never completed but there are still many paper origami cranes here in our house even though he doesn't live here anymore.
A lot of them are mini sized and some of them are so small that nobody believes that he made them without using tweezers but really he did.

Amaya's hand
And of course this is Yoko's hand.

Yoko (with a crane on her shoulder and one on her head too).

And this is Amaya also wearing cranes.

A close up of a sea of cranes.  (we were very careful not to step on any of them).

That's it for now.
Amaya and Yoko :) :)







1 comment:

  1. Hi Amaya and Yoko!

    Thank you for sharing about Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I agree, it is important to always remember such terrible things to ensure that they do not happen again.

    Have you read Hiroshima by Laurence Yep? It's a very good book, but of course it is quite sad.

    I love all of your cranes! My mama and I make tiny cranes too! There is a Japanese bookstore near us that sells origami paper in really small sizes. It's so beautiful!

    Love,
    Inky

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