Barefoot Gen, Japan, and I: The Hiroshima Legacy (Nakazawa Keiji interview)

[struggle4progress]

Nakazawa Keiji interviewed by Asai Motofumi
Translated by Richard H. Minear

... Mom always had nightmares about it. She said it was unbearable -- she could still hear my brother’s cries. Saying “I’ll die with you,” she locked my brother in her arms, but no matter how she pulled, she couldn’t free him. Meanwhile, my brother said, “It’s hot!” and Dad too said, “Do something!” My older sister Eiko, perhaps because she was pinned between beams, said not a thing. At the time, Mom said, she herself was already crazed. She was crying, “I’ll die with you.” Fortunately, a neighbor passing by said to her, “Please stop; it’s no use. No need for you to die with them.” And, taking her by the hand, he got her to flee the spot ...

In my writings there’s a fearsome anger toward power, toward rulers, and I don’t trust people who say nothing about the emperor system ... I remember well when the emperor came to Hiroshima in 1947. I wrote about it in my autobiography. The school gave the pupils one sheet of paper each. To do what? Take a six-inch compass and inscribe a circle, then color it in with red crayon. Find a piece of bamboo and make a hinomaru flag. I asked, “What are we doing?” They said, “Tomorrow his majesty the emperor is coming; line up on Aioi Bridge.” ... I lined up in the front row. A black Ford drove up, and the emperor came wearing a white scarf in the cold wind. In that cold, I was hot as fire inside. “That guy caused us all this, killed Dad,” and I wanted to fly at him. I still can’t forget that impulse. The teacher said, “Say banzai! Say banzai!” “Are you kidding?” With my geta I kicked a fragment of roof tile. It hit the tire and bounced off. I was angry ... I really wanted to strangle the guy ...

There was discrimination, and if you emphasized the atomic bombing openly, they’d gang up on you and say, “Don’t put on your hibakusha face!”—a strange way to organize a movement. When there were hibakusha on the Fukuryu-maru #5 and it became a big issue, Ota said, “Serves you right!” Meaning, now do you get it? That’s how badly hibakusha were alienated ...

Up until ten years ago I stayed absolutely away from Hiroshima. Merely seeing the city of Hiroshima brings back memories. The past. Seeing the rivers, I see in my mind’s eye rivers of white bones. Or the good spots for catching the crabs that grew fat on human flesh. Such memories come back, and when I walk about, I remember, “This happened,” “That happened.” I can’t bear to remember the smell of the corpses. I wanted to stay away from Hiroshima. I can’t express that stench in words. It brings back things I don’t want to remember. This frame of mind of mine is likely the same as for other hibakusha. My former teacher is here, and classmates gather for his birthdays. So I think, “Yes, Hiroshima’s okay.” I have friends here. Time has swept them away, those vivid memories. So I’ve come to want to be buried in Hiroshima. I like the Inland Sea, so I’ll have them scatter my ashes. I don’t need a tombstone ...

http://japanfocus.org/products/details/2638