LAST June 28, I was privileged but feeling overwhelmed to have heard personally Ms. Katsuko Kuwamoto's testimony of her atomic bombing experience in Hiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 1945, at the Hiroshima Heiwa Kaikan or the Hiroshima Peace Hall in the exact same city where the atomic bomb was dropped some decades ago.
War brings only hunger and child abuse
Kuwamoto was just six years old at the time, and her strongest memory was of hunger. She recalled that her father had been taken away to be deployed to the war front, leaving the family without anyone to support them.
She also remembered that all junior high school students — some as young as 12 or 13, up to 17 years old — were summoned to work in central Hiroshima to fill the labor shortage caused by the forced conscription of adult, able-bodied men.
Fortunately for her and her eight-year-old sister, they were both evacuated to stay with a relative on the outskirts. Their mother, however, remained in the city center to work.
Despite their young age, the girls obeyed and went to live with their aunt, whose home was already shared by two other families. One family even had to live alongside animals, which Kuwamoto described as "just like a pigpen", as the house was too small to accommodate everyone.
Because food was extremely scarce, “food stealing” became common in the household. As the only children without an adult guardian, Kuwamoto and her sister were constantly blamed. Eventually, the two decided to return to their mother. While their evacuation had involved a bus ride, they walked all the way back home on foot.
However, government welfare workers found them and ordered them to return to their aunt, telling them they would only slow their mother down if the war reached the city center. With no choice, the sisters complied —and once again faced the same accusations and punishments.
I’ve come to realize that war doesn’t just bring chaos and destruction — it also causes famine and labor shortages. And with labor shortages come child labor and, inevitably, increased child abuse.
'Pikadon'
Even though there was a war, young children like Kuwamoto and her sister were sent to schools on the outskirts of Hiroshima.
Meanwhile, in the city center, life continued as usual. Older children worked in factories, offices, and even in weapons manufacturing facilities.
Kuwamoto recalled that, typically, when bombings occurred, sirens would blare throughout Hiroshima, signaling children and mothers to take cover wherever they could—under tables and chairs, in bunkers, or in basements.
But this time, there were no sirens.
Only a sparkling, glittering light appeared in the sky. And then, a loud boom.
It was the pikadon—pika, meaning sparkle or glitter, and don, the sound of an explosion—what would come to be known as the atomic bomb.
The pikadon that no one understood at the time exploded 600 meters above the ground.
The blast shattered windows across the city, even the glass panes of the schools Kuwamoto attended.
She remembered how the classmate sitting closest to the window suffered terrible injuries as the glass shattered.
“Her blood was spattering across her face like a fountain,” Kuwamoto recalled.
Their teacher, seemingly in shock, burst into the room, picked up the injured girl, and ran in circles around the classroom, crying and shouting incomprehensibly. Kuwamoto and her classmates grabbed their teacher’s skirt and followed her, running round and round in confusion and fear.
Meanwhile, in the city center—ground zero—people were unaware of what had happened. Instead of taking cover, many stepped outside, some even expressing awe at the dazzling light of the pikadon. They thought the sparkle was beautiful.
But nothing is ever "business as usual" during war.
Shrapnel doesn’t choose its targets.
Not everything that glitters is gold, and not all sparkles are caused by celebration.
Some are born of bombs — atomic bombs.
Harrowing and unimaginable death
However, that sense of wonder was short-lived. Immediately after the explosion, the temperature began to rise, reaching a peak of 4,000 degrees Celsius — around 40 times hotter than the inside of a microwave oven.
Many people, most of them children, were overcome with intense thirst caused by the extreme heat. When they saw the river below, they rushed to drink from it. But almost immediately after the cold water reached their stomachs, their internal organs failed, and they died on the spot.
According to Kuwamoto, as experts explained, drinking cold water after exposure to such extreme heat can cause internal organs to shut down rapidly.
Yet those who died this way were considered fortunate compared to others who endured far more agonizing deaths.
Child laborers and people caught outside buildings began to suffer in ways beyond imagination. Some died instantly, while others experienced their skin melting and peeling away in large patches. They staggered through the streets like living corpses — flesh hanging from their bodies — only to collapse and die shortly after.
Other victims didn’t even understand what was happening. Their eyeballs began to protrude and separate from their sockets. In desperation, they tried to catch them, hoping everything would return to normal. But it didn’t. They died with their eyes literally out of their heads.
Bombs are cruel and indiscriminate killers. They don’t care if their victims are children, infants, or pregnant women. They simply destroy. CEA
****
The author is the only journalist representing the Philippines, along with seven Asean countries, admitted to Journalists Invitation Program of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Mofa) of Japan. Along with her are journalists from Cambodia, Laos, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, and Thailand.
For part 2: