Japan and Nuclear Events
Published on Friday, March 18, 2011 - 1:52pm
If any country on earth knows about the devastation and aftermath of nuclear events it is Japan. While what is happening now is in its
Japan and Nuclear Events
Published on Friday, March 18, 2011 - 1:52pm
If any country on earth knows about the devastation and aftermath of nuclear events it is Japan. While what is happening now is in its own way unprecedented, the Japanese people are handling the situation with characteristic stoicism and bravery. But the mental toll of these events lingers in the minds of Japanese authors and artists, and has led to some important recurring themes in Japanese literature and film.
The Realities of Radiation Exposure
School children learn the story of the young girl Sadako Sasaki and the Thousand Paper Cranes. Sadako was two years old when the atomic bomb exploded in Hiroshima, and her home was a mile away from ground zero. She began to succumb to Leukemia in 1955, when her friend told her the legend of the thousand paper cranes. If you fold a thousand origami cranes, you will be granted a wish. Sadako folded 644 cranes before she passed away, but her family and friends completed the thousand cranes for her. Statues of Sadako have been erected around the world as an enduring symbol of peace in the face of nuclear war.
In 1999 there was a critical accident at a nuclear power plant in Tokaimura, just a little northeast of Tokyo. Three of the workers there were exposed to a substantial amount of radiation and suffered a slow death over a period of 83 days. Japanese public televisi