In fact the location the atomic bomb actually exploded has its own bus and tram stop called the A-Bomb Dome.
Here stands the old Industrial Promotional Hall which, remarkably, survived the blast and remains today. The roof of the building has a dome shape and, though just a skeleton of its former self, its stark appearance amongst the gleaming modernity makes for a powerful reminder.
One of the walls where a window used to be.
Just next to the A-Bomb dome is a memorial featuring doves roosting on different levels.
Further on is the Children’s Peace Memorial featuring inspired by Sadako Saski, a girl who developed leukaemia as result of the bombing.
There is a belief in Japan that if you make 1000 origami paper cranes then you will get one wish. Sadako set about making the cranes but died before she had finished 1000. Her classmates made the rest in her honour and a memorial shows her holding a huge crane above her head. Long colourful strings of paper cranes hang around the memorial, donated by people all over the country.
The A-Bomb Museum is the largest building on the site and charges only 50 yen for admission, such a small amount that it may as well be free. When you first enter the museum you come to a large round room that explains the events leading up to the dropping of the bomb.
In the middle of the room is a model of what Hiroshima looked like after the explosion.
This particular sign really puts things into perspective.
In a way this is the only part of Hiroshima that stills looks the same. There is great debate as to whether the A-Bomb dome should be left standing as a morbid monument, or whether it should be taken down so that the city can move on entirely.
A large video screen showed black and white newsreel of the Enola Gay taking off, the bomb falling and the vast mushroom cloud bursting into the sky.
Later in the museum is a system of rooms featuring actual artefacts from the explosion. Melted coins and twisted metal signs give an indication of how monstrously powerful the force of the explosion was. People were turned to ashes instantly; one photograph showed a wall with a black smudge across it, a smudge that used to be a person.
Every turn gave another story of someone who had been lost; another artefact that had belonged to them and another reminder that it wasn’t just a country that was bombed, it was the people.
Further still into the museum and the displays talked of atomic bombs themselves, how weapons have been developed now that are far more powerful than the atomic bomb that fell on Hiroshima. Einstein and Bertrand Russell are presented with their Russell-Einstein manifesto on Nuclear disarmament. There are tables showing how huge numbers of nuclear tests are still carried out every year, especially by America and Russia.
There is one important document and one fact that the museum does like to remind you of. Japan was so weak by the end of the war that one official (I forget who) wrote that he was concerned the country was in such a state already that the bomb would not be allowed to show off its full power. Other documents claimed that so much money had gone into developing atomic weapons that really they had to be demonstrated in order to justify their expense. I’ve heard some foreigners complain that this point is overemphasised, but in balance I think the museum is focused on education into the horrors of atomic weapons rather than historical blame.
The most moving part of the museum for me was the survivors’ testimonies. A corridor with video screens and wooden benches allows you to sit and choose from about 20 different videos. There is a similar display at the Holocaust Museum in Washington and both really excellent in getting over the reality of what happened.
One man described how he was in school when they heard the plane fly over, then there was the most intense flash of light like lightning. A huge explosion was heard and the roof caved in. Although he was very close to the blast point he survived, coming to around his dead and dying classmates.
What many of the survivors mention are the dying people they came across, people who were severely burnt and unable to walk. These people all asked for water, but the advice everyone had been given was not to give burn victims water because it would kill them. Some survivors had tears in their eyes when they thought back to the agony they had witnessed and how they had not been able to help these people in their dying torment. Some of the survivors had given water, and then carried the guilt of seeing those who drank fading away before them.
Next to the museum is the Peace Memorial Hall which catalogues the names, photographs and memoirs of all the atomic bomb victims. Computer screens allow you to look through a massive library of information. The building itself has a unique design and feels very sombre. A fountain stands in the centre to symbolically answer the needs of all the dying who’d begged for water those 60 years ago.
The walls of the Peace Memorial Hall display a vast mural of Hiroshima with one tile for each of the victims of the bomb.
Step outside Peace Memorial Park and you find yourself on a busy main road that could belong to any city in Japan. Further down the road you’ll find passages leading into an underground shopping complex, perfect for sheltering from the heat. Young families try to control their tearaway children, teenagers yell into their phones, babies cry in prams, the elderly walk so slowly they get in everybody’s way, mobiles ring, music blares, people shout…
and you appreciate it all just one little bit more.
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