Hiroshima, 2017

One thought on “Hiroshima, 2017”

Tamar Nissim says:

May 26, 2018 at 3:35 pm

When I was 13 I read the book “The Flowers of Hiroshima”. It was a thin soft cover book written by the Swedish author Edith Morris (1959). This book was written in a poetic fashion, that resembles Japanese writing. It told the story of a Japanese woman and her encounter with a young American man, who came to live in Hiroshima few years after the end of World War II.
Reading the story, it took me to a poor neighborhood of the city where the houses are still built according to Japanese tradition. And I remember the interaction between the American, and the woman, and how he comes to understand her fate as part of the Hibakusha- survivors of the bomb, who were also victims of severe discrimination in the Japanese society. The survivals remained injured, physically and mentally, and continued to be “living evidence” to the ongoing consequences of the nuclear bomb.
When I was 16 I saw the film “Hiroshima mon amour” directed by Alain Resnais. This film was almost indecipherable for me when I saw it for the first time. The combination between the smooth bodies of the two lovers, and the flashbacks to the city’s nightmare echoed the gap between the past and the present. This black and white outstanding film emphasized the difficult to contain the horror and the harsh consequences of this war.
This photograph by Dana Arieli caught me unprepared and it took me a moment to remember why the building was so familiar and where it was. The casual way that tourists are taking selfies with the ruin building emphasizes the way this site became a “death tourism” site. The tourists split the scenery between the ruined building that remains as evidence of destruction, and the river where the Japanese paper lantern ceremony for commemorating the victims on the memorial ceremony every year.
For me, the remembrance of the place was accompanied by harsh physical feeling, as though I am walking again in the memorial park in Hiroshima. This filling was an echo to the filing I had while visiting Hiroshima almost 20 years ago. This photograph reminded of me the heavy feeling I felt in my stomach and chest, and reveled my memories that were engraved my memory from reading “The Flowers of Hiroshima” and watching the film “Hiroshima mon amour”.

Reply