A-bomb Testimony

Dear interested people,
This testimony is based in a real true story directly from the victim.
Please enjoy!

Taeko Miyoshi (9 years old back then)

At August 6 I was at home when a flash of light, like a lightning streaked over my head. Then everything went pitch black.

When it grew lighter again, I've found my mother, my grandmother, and I were lying in the rubble of our house.
Glass fragments was peppered on my body. My blood was spurting from the wounds. When my mother spoke, something dark red and looks like fish eggs dangled out. It was actually her internal organ. But, I just stared at her throat in silence.

My mother found some clothes and ripped it into pieces. She tried to stop my bleeding, by binding the clothes pieces to my wounds. She was desperate to stop my bleeding, although it's hard for her to breath. Her hand was wet and shiny with blood.

Then we heard voices, "Hurry! Get out! Fire is approaching!". A man picked me up and I screamed, "Mommy!". The man carried me over the rubble to a streetcar. My mother and grandmother stayed there, and they gradually dropped out of sight. I recall, my mother waving to me weakly with her red hand. It was the last time I ever saw her.

Along the streetcar tracks, victims of the bombing-their skin burned and dangling in strips., their body was covered by blood-staggered barefoot down the road. They were strangely silent.
I spent the night on the riverbank watching the sky burned red. All around me was junior high school's students, that looks like a burnt black doll.

"Mother!" "Water, please!" "I'm so hot!". Their voice gradually grew fainter and finally they died. It's odd but I don't feel lonely nor scared. We were all simply a human-shaped spirit with no emotion at all. In fact, it wasn't until three days later that I felt pain from my wounds. At the relief station, they removed the bloody cloth and I screamed 'till I lost consciousness.

When I finally came to, the war was over. But, that's when my suffering really began. My body was littered with tiny pieces of glass and maggots crawled in my wounds. Every night I replayed in my mind, over and over, the last image of my mom waving to me. As I looked up at the beautiful stars, I would think of her and quietly cry.


I actually didn't want to remember about the bombing, but children need to know the terrible cruelty of war. And so, with hopes and peace, I began to share my experience


MORE THAN 140,000 PEOPLE DIED
LET'S FACE IT!
NO NUCLEAR, NO BOMB, NO WAR!!

~Mentari