Kitab Atok: tuturan alambina

60 years ago this morning

Al-Fatihah to a fellow Kelantanese Nik Yusuf Nik Ali (left) and Syed Omar Alsagoff (centre) who died from the A-bomb dropped at 8:15am in Hiroshima. Both were 2nd year undergaduate students at University of Hiroshima, about 1.5km from the epicentre. A 1st year student, Abdul Razak Abdul Hamid (right) was the sole Malaysian survivor.

Nik Yusuf who died soon after the mushroom cloud engulfed the city on that tragic morning was cremated at Itsuka Ichi shrine and buried by one of his professors. Syed Omar suffered severely from the radioactive exposure - his skin cracked - later died in Kyoto on 3rd Sept. Abdul Razak returned home in Nov 1945, after the war ended.

Much has been said on the justification of the most disastrous human act in history. Though the main official reason has always been the only way to prevent more sufferings and deaths due to the grotesque brutalism of the Nippon Army, new records recently emerged pointing to the reason being 'more of impressing the Russians, than defeating the Japs'.

When I was a boy, I often listened to stories from my late great grandma about the war sufferings. How they were forced to hide in holes, and survived on tapioca and fruits. Soon, epidemic of fatal diseases spread and took many lives of the vulnerable.... including one of her daughters, my late grand mother, who was then still breast feeding my dad; her only child. Al-Fatihah, and may the world be a better place.

Miyoko Inoue (15 at the time) was doing fire prevention work with other students under the Student Mobilization Order in Zaimoku-cho at a place 500 meters from the centre of blast. This is what her mother, Tomiko, found where she searched for her daughter for three months after the bombing. Her daughter's body was never found. All students perished.

[Photo credit: Hiromi Tsuchida's 'Hiroshima Collection']


ps: a great pacifist suddenly passed away earlier today... Robin Cook, a man of clear conscience.

posted by Atok @ 10:01:00 pm