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Trek to Hiroshima takes local man back to tragic moment that shaped modern history We dedicate this bell as a symbol of Hiroshima Asptration bet all nuctear arms and wars be gone. and the nations live in true peace. May it ring to all corners of the earth to meet the ear of every man, for in it throb and palpitate the hearts of it‘s peaceâ€"loving donors. So may you, too, friends, step forward and toll this bell for peace. It has been 60 years since the first atomic bomb was dropped on the Japanese city. Exact numbers of the dead are impossible to come by, but it‘s believed at least 70000 were killed immediâ€" ately by the massive fireball and radiation. And at least that number again died from Il was the only day of rain in our 10â€"day visit to Japan. Not a downpour, but a steady drizzle, and it was fitâ€" ting for our tour of the Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima. Inscription on the Bell of Peace, Peace Memorial Park, Hiroshima, Japan The Arch in Peace Memorial Park. The concrete bunker underneath houses the register of the dead. Framed in the background is the Aâ€"Bomb Dome wATERTOO CHRONICLE Hometown News for an Awesome Hometown By Bruan Bourke For The Chronicle the butns, or the effects of radiation. Now a city of more than one million people, the name Hiroshima is now synâ€" onymous with man‘s ability to deliver death in an effiâ€" cient manner. Directly across from the park, the stadium of the Hiroshima Carp baseball team. _ Ironic, I thought, the two biggest American influâ€" ences on Japan, baseball and the atomic bomb, right across from each other. tt‘s a fourâ€"andâ€"a halfâ€" hour, highâ€"speed train ride from Tokyo to the far western edge of Japan and Hiroshiâ€" ma. A short. rattly streetcar ride from Hiroshima central station takes you over the bridge which spans the park. The city of New York, and the U.S. government have spent four years trying to come up with a suitable memorial for the 9â€"11 disasâ€" ter. With that in mind, the simplicity of Peace Memorial Park is striking. It‘s a vast expanse of green. on the exact spot where the bomb dropped so many years ago. WY _ fothe haart of Waterloo® Restaurant & Bar 583 Kinlg Street North â€" 880â€"1189 LIFESTYLE lust after 8 a.m., on Aug. 6, 1945, a 10,000â€"pound bomb. dubbed Little Boy, exploded some 2,000 feet above the Aiot Bridge. Thousands were incinerâ€" ated immediately. The ashes of an estimated 70,000 peoâ€" A fireball 1,000 feet wide blasted out, and temperaâ€" tures at ground level are estiâ€" mated to have reached 5,000 degrees. ple lie underneath the sim ple Burial Mound memorial. There is no single memoâ€" rial in the park. There are several different spots. In some cases, specific groups have erected a structure. However, there are a handful which are more general in their nature. The Aâ€"Bomb Dome is the only original building still standing at ground zero of the first nuclear strike in Hiroshima. Perhaps the most famous of the park‘s features is the Aâ€" Bomb Dome. The _ building _ was scorched but remained standing following the blast. It has since been rein forced and is lovingly pre served. even to the point of leaving bricks from the building in the place they fell ENJOY A TRIO OF FABULOUS "COT TAGE NIGHTS" TUESDAYS % All you can eat Riblets $10.99 ? WEDNESDAYS We (16 & under, : per adulit) ppopoppropppmppmmpponmnnpremmmpmmems T HLAR SDAYS #r siczion‘ Fajitas Eparrrn.*>s s ni90 weo "FAJITAS & CERVEZA" . "Caribow €reek .. Muskoka eflt/wkwt:f Waterlso" in 1945, It‘s a haunting vision, but in all honesty, pales with the power of at least a couple of other locations in the park. Several hundred feet along a huge plaza,. down from the spectacular museâ€" ums which chronicle the story of Hiroshima, and the city‘s continuing drive for peace, lies a simple concrete arch. Underneath that arch is a large concrete bunker. Inside that box, the regisâ€" ter of the dead. Each year, on the anniverâ€" sary of the bomb blast. thouâ€" sands of people gather in the plaza to. sadly. add the names of new victims of the explosion. If you stand just a few feet away from that arch, you can look through it. over the bunker, past the eternal flame which burns in a memorial fountain. The view perfectly frames the skeleton They are people who have lived for 60 years with the effects of radiation and just now are succumbing. Our trip to Hiroshima took us a long way from our primary location of Tokyo. When we decided to visit our daughter Allison, who works in Japan, I was insistent on visiting the city. I‘m certainly no history buff, but I did not want to miss the opportunity to see a spot where the: world changed in an instant. How many places like that are there on this planet? While the terror attacks of 9â€"11 and the fall of Commuâ€" nism in the 1980s are undeâ€" niably watershed moments in our history. 1 don‘t think anything compares to the bombing of Hiroshima, and later Nagasaki, as a moment we can point to, where not only did everything change, but the stakes became much higher. image of the Aâ€"Bomb dome several hundred feet away. It is impossible to stand in that spot, and not conjure up images of 1945. Waterioo native Allie Bourke, now a teacher in Tokyo, Japan, rings the Bell of Peace in Hiroshima‘s Peace Memoria! Park. In an age of 24â€"hour, instantancous communicaâ€" tion via all news channels, stories and events are fea tured, and often appear much bigger than they really are. Imagine how the horror of Hiroshima would play out \ Apmpbhamineinndrant mt t oetrand mad on traactorel ied ces |! A GIFT OF GOOD TASTE 1 Mc mur haur o C o fudime um : mis wee mepon pur uc n }/og'w'ne;(t visit compliments of Caribou (reek enjoy $5 off ho en oo on mar PM vut Wt aha ie ans Ahn ~ha At the beginning of this article is the inscription at the site of the Bell of Peace. There were hundreds of visiâ€" tors in the park at the time we visited. in that format today. Would it take away the mystery, and make it seem like some kind af disconnected video game? It‘s only by travelling to the site that you can really appreciate the extent of what happened that day. What caught my eve was a large coach bus. It stopped along the bridge next to the belt, and off came a large group of elderly Japanese. I‘d estimate them all to be in their 60s and 705. On that drizzly Wednesâ€" day morning. 7.000 miles from our own home. we watched as each of them walked quietly to the bell and rang it once in their hope for peace. They were silent as they made their pilâ€" grimage, but many had tears in their eyes as they walked away from the bell. 1 know they were tolling the bell for the future, as well as for friends, family, and cmuntrymen who died on that day. But they rang it for our innocence as well, for it . more than anything else, also perished at that moment. Feperns Auguct +300