10,000 lights flicker on the rivers
8/7/00 
The lantern floating ritual floats prayers
for the repose of the souls of the A-bomb
victims and for peace in the new century.
It takes place on the rivers throughout Hiroshima
City during the evening of the 6th. Ten thousand
lights flickered across the delta.
On the bank of the Motoyasu River next to
the A-bomb Dome, lanterns with hand-written
names of the dead or pledges for peace began
to flicker on the water surface at 6:00 pm.
For the first time this year the city took
advance requests for lantern papers or to
have a certain message written on a lantern
"to allow people around the world to
send peace messages." About 300 of the
5,000 lanterns provided by the city carried
messages left by students away on school
trips or tourists who could not be present
on the actual day.
Ms. Shimoko Mihara (70) of Nishi Ward, who
lost most of her classmates when they were
exposed to the bomb while demolishing buildings
as mobilized students, brought, for the first
time, her granddaughter Eri (11) of Toyonaka
City. Mihara said, "I want the next
generation to remember this scene of Hiroshima
coming together to mourn its dead, and to
build a world without war."
Thanks to a local college professor and his
students, people around the world saw this
century's final lantern-floating in real
time on the Internet.
[Caption] Near the A-bomb Dome, colorful floating lanterns
carry desires for peace in the 21st century.
(August 6, 7:20 pm, Motoyasu River)
