On the anniversary of the Hiroshima bomb I want to share a short thread. In 2015 I met 81-year-old Tetsushi Yonezawa on the 70th anniversary of the “pika-don”. Aged 11 he was on a crowded streetcar holding his mother’s hand when the bomb struck at 8:15am 
He was surrounded by people when the glass blew in and the city turned black. He credited the strength of the metal car withstanding the blast to saving his life, and every year he came back to Hiroshima on 6 August to share his story for fear it would be lost.
He travelled from Kyoto year after year to talk to schoolchildren, terrified that they would one day no nothing of the impact of the bomb on every generation that followed, and I just learnt that he died two years ago and so I’m passing on his story.
I then travelled to Nagasaki to meet Toshiko Yamasaki whose father Tsutomu Yamaguchi was one of a handful of survivors known as “niju hibakusha” - double bomb survivors.
Yamaguchi was hit by the first bomb and got on the train to flee the fallout, travelling home to Nagasaki to tell people what had happened when the second bomb hit. She retold her father’s story as she wanted people to understand that the bomb didn’t just destroy one generation.
He died from stomach cancer in 2009 but her mother also had cancer, her brother died from cancer and she had a perpetually low blood cell count.
“The bomb was not just one person’s story, it became the story of so many afterwards for generations” she told me.
“The bomb was not just one person’s story, it became the story of so many afterwards for generations” she told me.
While we watch the genocide unfold in Gaza I’m reminded by both of these extraordinary people of the importance of oral testimony and educating people on what the repercussions will be for years to come.
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