Learning about peace by remembering the horrors of war.

Yesterday I attended a seminar on Peace Education. When I entered the auditorium where the presentation was to take place, there was an elderly gentleman sitting at the front of the room. His name was Koji Ikeda. Mr. Ikeda is "hibakusha", a survivor of the bombing of Hiroshima. He is 90 years old and he spoke to us about his personal experience of the day the A-Bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. On that day, which was like any other day, he was in his home holding his infant son, while his wife was out doing errands. He said he lived near a prison, whose walls were high, and stretched on for a distance past his house. There was a sudden intense sound and he knew there had been some kind of blast but he did not know what it was or how serious is at was. His wife had been outside and when the bombing occurred she was thrown 20 feet, into the wall of the prison. She lay unconscious for some time, but Mr Ikeda did not know where his wife was at the time. When she regained consciousness, she came to their home. He said she grabbed their baby from his arms and she immediately began nursing him. Mr. Ikeda looked at his wife and could not believe what he saw. The skin on her face was blistered and beginning to come off and the skin on her nipples were also blistered and burned. She did not seem to care, as she was in shock and continued to feed their baby. Mr. Ikeda described his wife’s appearance as being somewhat horrific, her face being transformed into what he described as being like a monkey’s face. As Mr. Ikeda spoke he described the unfortunate ordeal his wife had to endure for weeks, months, and years as she battled the effects of radiation poisoning. He said her face was destroyed and scarred from that point on. The amazing thing is she died just ten years ago but the effects of the bombing stayed with her, physically and emotionally, for her entire adult life. It has stayed with Mr. Ikeda as well, and he is a peace advocate, making it a point to speak with groups of people about the atrocities of war and nuclear weapons. He was a gentle man and he spoke slowly, yet poignantly to us all. The room was filled with close to 200 people and we were all absolutely silent and riveted while he spoke. Many of us were crying as it was so painful and sad to hear of his experiences.

After Mr. Ikeda spoke a young woman named, Migiwi Ishitani spoke. Her father was also hibakusha. She spoke on behalf of her father who had passed away just a couple years ago. She told us that whenever her father would speak about his experience of being a Hiroshima survivor, he always prefaced his talk with an apology for the atrocities the Japanese participated in during the war. Ms. Ishitani then apologized in honor of her father, and she broke into tears as she spoke to us. Listening to both Mr. Ikeda and Ms. Ishitani was an incredibly moving experience. Hearing what they had to say, and how the horrors of war had touched them both in very direct and personal ways made me realize that we must continually revisit these atrocities in order to embrace peace.