Contributions from people overseas who are sharing the message of Hiroshima

People must understand the horror of nuclear weaponsby Miho Cibot

Bonjour!

I married a Frenchman when I was 25 years old. When I asked him where he wanted to go for our honeymoon, he replied, "Hiroshima". He explained, "During my military training, I was told to hide under a desk if an atomic bomb was dropped. However, I heard that an entire city was destroyed by an atomic bomb. I want to know what happened to the people living there."

In 1975, we visited Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. He froze in front of an exhibit of some rice-bowls that had melted together. I already was aware of the damage caused by the atomic bomb through photographs and movies so I wasn't as shocked by the sights at the museum. Later, however, when we were having a cup of tea, I happened to hear a conversation between two survivors of the bombing and it shook me. I somehow felt the reality of the atomic bomb more clearly at that moment.

But I soon became a busy mother of two children.

Miho (on the left) shares paper cranes for the first exhibition of "Sadako et les grues en papier (Sadako and the Paper Cranes)" in France (March 2005).

Miho Chibot

Born in Shizuoka, she moved to France in 1975. She founded "Institut Hiroshima Nagasaki (Hiroshima Nagasaki Research Institute)" and is an advisor to AFCDRP. Also a poet, last spring she published the fantasy novel "Legend of Babaron". Today she lives in Malakoff.

One day in 1980, my friend asked me to take care of her 8-year-old boy, Nicholas. While my own children were napping, he was playing with a toy airplane in the living room. Suddenly, he shouted, "Next we'll drop the atomic bomb!" I was shocked and I showed him a book about the bombing. I told him about the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

At that moment, I felt strongly that it was my responsibility to share the reality of the bombing. France, the country to which I moved for marriage, has nuclear weapons and children treat them playfully without really knowing what an atomic bomb is. It's like Japanese youth wearing Nazi swastikas without realizing that the Nazis killed millions of people. If children started playing Nazis in France, the adults would certainly teach them the history involving the Nazis.

So I tried to share the reality of the atomic bomb to people in France. My husband and I published a book, we held exhibitions, and we produced an animated film, "Riding a Crane," which told the story of Sadako and the Children's Peace Monument.

Moreover, we appealed to French cities in our region to take part in Mayors for Peace, which was founded in 1985. We then called on members of this group to create AFCDRP (Association of French Communes, Departments and Regions for Peace), established in 1997. This is a network of local authorities that make plans for peace events every year to promote "peace culture." In France, the number of members involved in the Mayors for Peace has now reached 79.

Civilians always become the victims of war. And the environmental damage caused by war harms our earth for a very long time. We must create a world without war in order to pass on this beautiful planet to our children.