Sunday, August 5, 2012

Japan Marks 67th Anniversary of Atomic Bombing in Hiroshima


If you think that this year people pay more attention to the anniversary of the atomic bomb dropped in Hiroshima in 1945 because of the Fukushima accident and ongoing radiation contamination, you really have to look for the news.

Yomiuri Online headlines on August 6, 2012, from the top:

  • LDP to submit "reprimand of the prime minister" on August 7

  • Successor to Shuttle to be outsourced to 3 private companies, says NASA

  • Table Tennis women's team advance to final, guaranteed medal

  • Koji Murobushi won Bronze in Hammer Throw (the rest is all Olympics)


Asahi online headlines:
  • Murobushi won Bronze in Hammer Throw

  • Hiding radiation exposure has been done for long time

  • Men's 100-meter dash won by Bolt

  • Japan's men's fencing team won silver in team foil

  • (In the Social News section) Namie-machi mayor to attend the ceremony in Hiroshima


Mainichi online headlines:
  • Shooting in the US midwest at a Sikh temple, 6 dead 3 seriously injured

  • Typhoon No.11 causing heavy rain in Okinawa

  • Hiroshima Peace Ceremony, from Fukushima to Hiroshima


On Twitter, of people I follow (not many, I admit), only one person tweeted "silent prayers for the atomic bomb victims" (he is a nuclear researcher).

Japanese athletes are doing extremely well, I think, in London Olympics. Of the Olympic news not mentioned above,

Men's medley relay in swimming: Silver
Men's boxing (bantam class): advanced to semi-final
Women's soccer: advanced to semi-final
Men's soccer: advanced to semi-final

The fantastic rumor about the opening ceremony is still going strong by the way. There is a tangential twist to the story, as people express outrage against Governor of Tokyo Shintaro Ishihara who reportedly said "Westerners do judo like wild animals", calling it "reishizumu" (that's racism in Japanese-English or English-Japanese) against white people.

I would think there are westerners who are proud that their judo style is like wild animals.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

there u go
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDYybJFOPUE
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bear_McCreary

Stock said...

AS the competitive money printing continues, and social mood declines, there will be more self centered racism and hatred.

Japan is undergoing a test right now, and so far they are failing.

arevamirpal::laprimavera said...

Anon, thank you for the calming music. Nice. I wanted to post a piece of music by Lou Harrison which he composed after he was traumatized by the atomic bombing, but I couldn't find the video of the performance.

Steveo, I have to agree. It's hysterical, but they are not aware.

Little Canary said...

How came the title of this post is regarding to the anniversary of the atomic bomb and then switch to the London Olympic and Ishihara "roujin" comments...
I cant find the links between them.

Anonymous said...

I can. The point of the post is that Japanese (media at least) don't care about Hiroshima, prattling away about Olympics. People are more concerned about whether IOC threw the Japanese athletes out because IOC is racist, and Ishihara is Ishihara, in his own class. Just another day in Japan. See, it all makes sense.

Anonymous said...

My heartfelt condolences and sympathy for the ongoing physical and emptional suffering of the Japanese people due to the tragedies of the bombings at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as well as the ongoing tragedy at Fukushima.

War and it's bedfellow, Nuclear Power, must be brought to an end.

Love truly is the answer. May we remember to teach our children this important lesson through not only our words, but our actions.

Namaste.

Anonymous said...

Oops! Correction to my typo: "emotional"

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