Every May citizens in Hiroshima go through a ritual. A powerful, symbolic ritual that reveals one perspective of the Japanese toward Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Wednesday, May 16th was the day this year. At the cenotaph in the Hiroshima Peace Park volunteers open a tomb beneath the cenotaph.
It houses 114 books which list the victims of Hiroshima of Nagasaki. Each May, the books are removed and inspected. Stored in an underground tomb, in a tropical/swamp environment where mold and fungus are constant enemies, the books are inspected page by page for signs of damage. The books list 308,725 names.
The Masters of Marketing never miss a marketing opportunity. The Japanese know, today, exactly the number of victims of the bombings. A criteria was established decades ago: exposure based on distance from the epicenter within a specific time frame after each bombing.
The books could have been filled very long ago, but that would have squandered a wonderful annual marketing opportunity of victimhood. The Japanese leverage the bombings with the international community to divert attention from their own massive atrocities during World War II. Adding names to the books is one part of the campaign.
Japan Times
Names are added to the books just once each year. The dead from August 6th. of the previous year to August 5th. of the current year are added. It takes time. They begin the inscribing in mid-May. This year over 5,500 names will be added. It’s quite an annual listing of the carnage. It plays well with the international media. It’s a very strong visual: the cenotaph, the 114 books laid out for inspection, the city employees adding the names of the newly dead, the prayers for the living and the dead.
What happens when all the victims have been added to the books? The annual ritual will be over. They will move the books from their outside grave (graves…get it) to the interior of the museum. The worries of the dampness of the crypt will be a thing of the past. The books, with over 300,000 names in them can be displayed for all the world to see.
With the turning of the calendar, this ceremony of remembrance will fade from the world’s consciousness. But maybe not. This powerful, symbolic ritual, could be continued.
I would guess the Japanese will expand the definition of victims to include the children of victims. The annual ritual could go on for another hundred years. It would be foolish to pass up decades of a marketing opportunity for the victims of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.