The intermittent rain keeps the temperature of the Capital low but the sun makes it humid. One can see life coming back to normal as the schools have started opening after the long summer vacations. There is flurry of activities on the roads in the mornings as everyone is rushing to their work place or the educational institutes.
The first event was an exhibition of paintings by Ahmad Habib at the Nomad Gallery. Nageen Hyat, Director of the Gallery said, "Ahmad Habib creates low horizon lines in his landscape in a modern personal interpretation through the medium of watercolours and oils. He has a strong command on the medium he employs while handling his space with ease and dexterity. Ahmad's work is innovative, refined and reflects a clearly individualistic mood and environment through spontaneous strokes of colour."
Habib described his work as: "I am a realist painter and paint subjects from my surroundings. Landscapes, walls, old doors, and other such subjects invite my attention and motivate me to express my self through colours." He is a painter, sculptor, writer and designer. He has been participating in a number of group and solo exhibitions since 1995. His articles have been published in mainstream English and Urdu newspapers since 1998. He has worked in a number of programmes and projects on the electronic media. He has received numerous awards and honours for his paintings and sculptures.
The second event was an exhibition titled, "Prayer for Peace" that was arranged jointly by the embassy of Japan and several NGOs to mark the 60th anniversary of atom = bombing two Japanese cities --Hiroshima and Nagasaki -- by the US. The exhibition was inaugurated by the National Assembly Speaker Chaudhry Amir Hussain together with the Japanese Ambassador Nobuaki Tanaka. Mr Hussain said that, "wars bring destruction and do not solve conflicts. Conflicting parties eventually have to sit at the negotiating table to find a solution so why not do that before starting a war,".
Pakistan believes in peaceful dialogue to solve conflicts, he said in apparent reference to the country's ongoing composite dialogue with India. The Speaker expressed his sympathy over the death of 214000 people that got killed in Hiroshima and Nagasaki as a result of the US bombing on the two cities.
Japanese Ambassador Nobuaki Tanaka said that the devastation of the two cities forged a collective desire in his nation for peace and shaped its constitution and foreign policy.
Japan firmly believes that war should never be employed to settle international disputes, he said.
In that context he also expressed remorse and offered apology to the peoples of the countries who suffered Japanese aggression and colonialism.
He hoped the exhibition would help build a popular resolve to eradicate 'the violence of our times.'
Eight large-sized posters placed in the exhibition hall told the story of the step by step revival of the two bombed cities. These showed the heat blasts of super high temperatures, mangled human bodies, and help received from abroad for reconstruction and the slow death of a young girl, Sadako which stirred the construction of peace memorial there.
A documentary film on the destruction caused by the atom bomb would be screened every hour for two days at the exhibition venue at a local hotel.
A film Mothers prayer showed an old mother, who had lost her son during the 1945 atomic bomb blast, trudging her way to the site of the memorial. It showed heart rending scenes of men, women and children reduced to cinder, losing sight, limbs, and the scourge of leukemia that the survivors had to suffer.
The effect of radiation, cancer and leukemia continue to devastate people even after 60 years of the great catastrophe. The film appealed for the abolition of nuclear weapons and world peace from a mother's viewpoint and it concluded with a prayer that there is never to be another Hiroshima or Nagasaki.
Another film was titled, 'On a Paper Crane.' In the film, Tomoko is a young girl living in Hiroshima. One day during her summer vacation, she visits the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum alone. It is for a project called "My Adventure" as part of her homework.
The unbelievable facts about atom - bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki overwhelm Tomoko. Shocked and exhausted, she strolls to the Peace Memorial Park and there she meets a mysterious girl. The girl's name is Sadako. She was exposed to radiation at the age of 2 and died when she was 12. Sadako guides Tomoko to a strange tour...
Each photograph in the exhibition has its own story to tell. The brief outline of Atom Bomb goes like this that at 8.15am August 6, 1945, the first atom bomb used against a human population exploded approximately 580 meters above the centre of Hiroshima.
In a blinding horrifying instant, that single explosion reduced an entire city to scorched rubble , taking countless precious lives and devastating the city's social , political, economic ,and medical functions. In comparison to the destruction caused by natural disasters or conventional weapons, this tragedy represented an entirely new order of magnitude.
The atom bomb showered the earth below with high levels of radiation which penetrated deep into its victim's bodies, destroying cells and tissues. The potential effects of this radiation threaten the health of survivors to this day, and the mere threat has inflicted tremendous psychological damage. The suffering caused by radiation is immeasurable.
The physical damage inflicted by atom bomb included burns from the intense thermal rays, injuries from the blast and cellular destruction by radiation. Because the number of casualties continued to climb for years, the total number of deaths attributed to the cities estimate, the total number of dead in Hiroshima by the end of December 1945, when deaths from acute conditions had subsided, was approximately 140, 000 .
Shigeru Oriman was a first year student at second Hiroshima Prefectural Junior High School. Every day, he and his classmates were mobilised to clear away demolished buildings. He was exposed to the A-bombing on August 6 in Nakajima Shinmachi (currently Peace Memorial Park), approximately 600 meters from the hypocentre. Later, his mother walked through the A-bombed city looking for her son.
At last, she found a body doubled up with his lunch box held firmly beneath its stomach. The body was so burned she could not recognise her son: she knew him only by his lunch box. The lunch he never ate was burned black.
A person sitting on the steps to the bank waiting for it to open was exposed to the flash from the atom bomb explosion. Receiving the rays directly, the victim must have died on the spot from the massive burns.
The surface of the surrounding stone steps was turned whitish by the intense heat rays. The place where the person was sitting became dark like a shadow.
Standing a mere 160 meters north-west of the hypocentre, the building was heavily damaged by the blast, then burned from the ceiling down by fires ignited instantly by the heat rays. All occupants of the building under the central dome miraculously remained standing. The skeletal structure of the dome looming high above the ruins was a conspicuous landmark and became known locally as the A-bomb Dome.
The Children's Peace Monument, also as the tower of Paper Cranes, stands in Peace Memorial Park. This monument was inspired by Sadako Sasaki, a vivacious young girl suddenly struck down by radiation after effects. Sadako, two at the time of bombing, developed leukemia about ten years later. In the hospital she used medicine wrapping paper to fold over a thousand paper cranes in the desperate hope that doing so would cure her. She continued bravely folding cranes until the day she died-October 25, 1 Sadako's grieving classmates decided to build a monument in her honour.
Their sincere passion led to a nation-wide fund raising campaign to build a monument for her and the thousands of other children lost to the atom bombing. With contributions from all over Japan, the monument was built and unveiled on May 5, 1958. On top of the concrete tower stands the bronze statue of a young girl holding over her head a huge paper crane symbolising the hope of all children for a peaceful future.
In and around Peace Memorial Park stand numerous monuments to A-bomb victims. Each and every one of these monuments, beyond its specific purpose, embodies the common desire that world peace is realised.
Every one of us should say a prayer for peace in this violence ridden and terror stricken world. So long until next week folks.
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