Original subtitles

Grandma, I have something to show you.

What?

I think this is a scene with Grandpa.

It's in colour and I believe it's Grandpa.

- Really? - I'm not quite sure.

Yes, it looks like him!

- It does, doesn't it? - Yes.

He'd lost a lot of weight during the war.

I'll play it to you again.

He seems to be demonstrating something.

What is he trying to show?

The atomic blast made the door...

- ...cave in? - Yes, it imploded.

Yes, that's his face.

How do you feel, seeing him like this?

It's nice to remember him.

The day the atomic bomb detonated over Hiroshima,

my mother's family was living in this country house.

70 km away from the city.

My grandfather was an internist at the Hiroshima Red Cross Hospital.

After the atomic bomb was dropped,

he tried to rescue the wounded.

Amidst death and destruction.

Never in his life did he speak about what he experienced during that period.

Oh dear, this album has got old.

Oh yes, this photo...

Doesn't he look handsome?

And this one?

- This photo? - Yes.

It was taken randomly. There is no special meaning to it.

We weren't even engaged yet.

I was still a student

and he was working at the Red Cross Hospital.

These were his colleagues.

The war was getting worse every day.

War planes were flying over Hiroshima.

Because of this danger,

everyone who had accommodation in the countryside

was ordered to evacuate to it.

That's why we moved to your grandfather's parents' house.

During the week, your grandpa worked at the hospital in Hiroshima

and came home at weekends.

He was happy to see your mother.

The day the atomic bomb was dropped,

he took the first train to Hiroshima as usual.

When he came home ten days later,

he didn't say anything.

Not a single word.

Except that "there had been a bombing".

So I had no idea what had happened.

We didn't have a radio. Nor a TV, of course.

We received no information at all.

All I heard was from a young woman coming back from Hiroshima.

She said a "big bomb" had been dropped.

That was all. There was no other information.

This photo I received many years later.

He seems to be examining an atomic bomb victim's white blood cells.

If you want to find out more,

you should look for nurses

who worked with your grandfather back then

and listen to their stories.

Who is this?

Who could this be... She's wounded.

I don't know...

She wasn't in my class.

- That's Sumiko Miyahara! - Oh, that's me!

- Is that you, Kayoko? - Yes.

That looks like your neck.

I just told you how I had to take off the gauze.

Yeah, that was terrible...

There weren't many doctors around.

We heard that your grandfather had taken the train,

then walked to the city to treat patients.

But we didn't know exactly where he was working.

Everyone was in a panic.

People were lying on the floor, squashed together like sardines.

Every morning we carried the dead outside on stretchers.

Then we burned them. We did it.

It went on for about a month.

Meanwhile, flies left eggs in wounds.

The wounds were filled with maggots.

Have you ever seen fly maggots?

Living bodies were full of maggots.

- I don't want to talk about the bomb. - But that's the topic.

- Should we be silent? - Yes, it's enough.

It's all because of the bomb.

The bomb destroyed us. I don't want to talk about it.

I suppose this tree is about 200 years old.

It was already this big when I was a child.

I have nearly lived 100 years.

I'll soon be 90.

It was already huge then.

I feel my childhood is at the far end of an old tunnel.

It was the time when the Japanese provoked

the Manchurian Incident.

Three soldiers blew up a barbed wire barrier

in a suicide attack.

After that they were hailed as heroes throughout Japan.

I was in the 2nd grade back then,

and I deeply wanted to become someone who received such praise.

That's why I wanted to become a Red Cross nurse.

It was the female equivalent of becoming a soldier.

A whiny face...

People used to say I had a whiny face.

My mother was afraid I wouldn't find a husband

because I looked like this.

She said that I should work,

since with a face like mine one had to work.

But when I look at these pictures,

I think I became prettier and prettier.

I'm not so bad!

I love nurses.

When I grow up,

I'll apply to the Red Cross

and I'll serve my country.

I would sing this song at elementary school.

Songs like that were a great influence on us.

The roar of the cannon is fading away

Even the insects have fallen silent

The blowing wind reeks of blood

The colour red tints the grass

What is more deathly, friends or foes?

Hats and torn sleeves are scattered

And the pale faces of the collapsed bodies

Are the same colour as the grass

I wanted to be a Red Cross nurse

because it was a short cut to receiving a badge of honour.

I believed war was a good thing.

But then

the atomic bomb was dropped. And when I came to Hiroshima

there was nothing left.

No houses, no trees, nothing at all.

So many people were killed.

And those who had survived were dying.

Is that what you called a "holy war"?

Is that something to be decorated for?

That's what I asked myself.

Ever since I've always said war is terrible.

War is terrible.

I have to talk about it.

Otherwise no one will know what really happened.

Only once did I ask my grandfather

what he experienced in Hiroshima after the atomic bombing.

He answered

that it was impossible to put into words.

Those who had not been there would never understand.

I remember that he was laughing and crying at the same time.

How was he when he first came home after the bombing?

How he was?

He said "I'm home", as always.

He hadn't changed at all.

What was the first thing he did?

The first thing he did?

He went into the garden

and ate tomatoes and other fresh vegetables.

I thought it was strange.

But since everything had been vaporized in Hiroshima,

there probably wasn't any fresh food there.

Everyone lived on canned food.

I think he just wanted to eat something fresh.

It left a big impression on me.

When you heard Hiroshima was bombed,

weren't you worried?

War was all I knew back then.

First the war against Manchuria, then against China.

War went on and on.

And then the war against the USA started.

I'd known only war since my primary school days.

That's why I was desensitized.

"Desensitized" might not be the right word.

All I thought was: yet another bombardment.

Good morning!

Here I am.

Thank you for coming.

Before beginning my speech,

I'd like to inform you that there is a film crew here today.

The director is Aya Domenig, from Switzerland.

Like me, her grandfather was an army doctor in Hiroshima

at the time of the atomic bombing.

Now,

the Japanese are the only people in the world

who have been exposed to high levels of radiation,

who've been dying and suffering for a very long time.

Only doctors who experienced Hiroshima know what really happened.

I'm the last surviving doctor from that era,

so when I die, this knowledge will vanish with me.

Dr. Hida, you were working at the army hospital back then.

But where were you at the moment of the detonation?

I wasn't there. Otherwise I'd have been killed.

And I wouldn't be talking to you now.

As it happens, the night before the bombing,

I made a house call to check up on a child 6 km outside Hiroshima.

I stayed there overnight,

intending to return to Hiroshima the next morning at 7 am,

but I overslept until 8 am.

Shortly after 8 am, I saw planes flying over.

While giving an injection to the child, I was blinded by a flash of light.

Everyone I examined in such a condition died.

Hardly anyone survived.

Where nuclear weapons detonate,

medical care is at an end.

During the first three days,

people died from burn injuries.

But on the morning of the fourth day,

people began to die from bizarre symptoms.

I'd never before seen cases like these.

They started bleeding from the nose and mouth.

I'd seen that before. It's not particularly unusual.

But what I had never seen

was people bleeding from the eyes.

And then, when I'd examine their mouths,

there was an awful stench.

It smelled rotten.

I couldn't understand

how a living human body could be rotting.

And as they approached death,

large amounts of blood came out of their noses and mouths.

They would bleed from the anus, and women from the vagina.

In the end they really bled a lot.

And then they died.

I'd never seen anyone die like this before.

Only Japanese doctors back then witnessed that.

No other doctors in the world have seen such things.

Well, I can't read these poems.

He wrote these poems about me.

Why not? Please read them!

- You want me to read them? - Yes.

Having a beloved young lady I sit alone in this room

In a quiet night

On the way home Feeling somewhat melancholic

I count for a while My steps

After our date he felt lonely on his way home.

So he counted his footsteps. That's what this poem means.

This wasn't a dramatic love scene like you see today!

But he wrote many poems like this one.

Grandpa loved you very much, didn't he?

Yes, I think so.

Here are some poems about your mom.

He wrote these poems in 1946 and 1947, the postwar period.

We were still living in the countryside and he commuted to work.

It tells of how your mother waves to greet him.

My small child, alone Greets me from afar

Waving hands she calls me I hasten my steps

I can't find any poems about the atomic bomb.

I didn't know that my grandfather had written such poems.

While after the atomic bombing

he commuted between two completely different worlds,

he only wrote poems about the intact one.

And my grandmother never asked him any questions.

Today she rarely thinks about the bomb.

She is suffering from cancer

and all her energy goes into fighting her pain.

I wonder where I put it.

I thought I'd put it here.

I always leave things somewhere!

Weird... It's not in here. I wouldn't have put it in here, would I?

No.

- I will take your shoes. - Thank you!

Welcome!

Good morning!

Good morning!

May I sit down while I talk?

Yes!

Thank you very much.

I've become too old to stand for a long time.

How was the radioactivity removed after the bombing?

At the time of the atomic blast in Hiroshima,

we didn't know radioactivity existed.

We called this bomb the "new type bomb".

Everyone fell ill,

but no one knew that the illnesses were caused

by radioactivity.

Because we didn't know that invisible radioactive particles

were making people sick

we just said "Hiroshima" was the cause...

My grandfather didn't talk about the atomic bomb.

- He didn't? - No.

That's because it was forbidden to talk about it.

He must have been scared.

Following the atomic blast, the USA occupied Japan for seven years.

Under US military occupation,

the effect of atomic radiation on the human body

was declared a military secret.

Atomic bomb victims were not allowed to talk about their suffering.

Nor were they allowed to write about it.

Japanese doctors were allowed to examine their patients,

but not allowed to keep medical records.

Doctors were not allowed to confer about cases or research the subject.

They were not allowed to write any medical papers.

It was an order from the occupying army,

and anyone violating it was arrested.

Fear made everyone shut up.

Four years after the bombing,

in 1949,

the American research institute ABCC

started to round up radiation victims

in order to study the effects of radiation.

However, before any medical interview,

people were asked when, where and how they had been exposed to the bomb.

Most said they were in a particular part of Hiroshima,

in such-and-such street.

But some people said they weren't in the city that day.

They arrived in the afternoon,

the next day, or even days or a week later.

Meanwhile, they started to feel sick and didn't know why.

The Japanese doctors couldn't help them,

so they wanted American doctors to examine them.

All these people were sent home immediately.

That's why the data gathered by the USA

is only relevant to victims directly exposed within 2 km of ground zero.

All the others were excluded from that research.

So the Americans have

absolutely no data regarding internal radiation.

And to this day they insist that internal radiation doesn't exist.

Everyone at the hospital had diarrhoea.

I also got sick. I was vomiting,

I couldn't eat anything and became very weak.

I had a fever of over 104°F.

Family members then told me

that even people who came to Hiroshima after the atomic blast

were dying one by one.

I was afraid I was going to die like them

because of Hiroshima.

But my doctor said

that anyone could have my illness.

He saw no evidence that it was caused by the atomic bomb.

He told me it was an "ordinary" disease

and suggested: "Have a delicious meal".

That was all.

When my feet felt cold, I tried to warm them up.

I tried cupping, massage,

whatever I could think of.

But even 40 years later,

I could hardly breathe.

I just learned

to live like this.

One day, while weeding a field,

I started to sweat a lot.

I was amazed how good it made me feel.

That's why I began to work in the field.

I gave up relying on medicine

and decided to become healthy by sweating.

It's ill, too.

It doesn't function.

It's got stage fright. It's not human but has stage fright.

Radiation destroys the inner structure of the body.

It will attack any organ it can -

thyroid, uterus, lung, bowel, liver...

Even though it's not visible from outside,

the inside of the body decays.

Were doctors scared of developing symptoms themselves?

Yes, they were.

At first, we didn't understand what patients meant by "extreme exhaustion".

Some doctors would even diagnose them as neurotic.

Until they developed similar symptoms themselves.

Yet it wasn't understood as a medical issue.

And the Americans claimed there was nothing wrong.

No one knew what to believe.

Some doctors collapsed and died.

Were you afraid?

Well,

I thought what would be would be.

If I got ill, then that was my destiny.

I wasn't too nervous.

In the early 1950s

the American occupation ended

and most people just wanted

to forget and move on.

My grandparents had returned to the city.

Grandpa set up his own practice and had a house built for it.

My grandmother helped him with his work and raised their children,

my mother and her two siblings.

The family could afford to make trips

and my grandfather took pictures with his new camera.

It's like a journey through time.

These poems remind me of those days.

Did Grandpa read these poems to you?

No way. He kept them hidden away. He never read them to anyone.

My grandfather captured his city, a city still scarred by the atomic bomb.

And he saw

how memorial sites were built to present Hiroshima as a city of peace.

But while he was photographing this new Hiroshima,

Japan failed

to truly acknowledge its recent past.

And most atomic bomb victims

remained shrouded in silence.

Nothing good ever came of talking about it.

Nothing at all!

The greatest fear among mothers

was that their children might never find jobs or a spouse.

That's the truth.

Children of atomic bomb survivors hardly found any jobs.

Everyone thought they'd eventually get sick and wouldn't stay on the job.

And it was almost impossible for them to get married.

It's still like that even today!

Now it's affecting the third generation.

If you, for example, meet someone from an important family

who you'd like to marry,

a family with a 400-year tradition and an impressive family tree,

you might go steady with a man from such a family.

But if they discovered that your grandfather was a radiation victim,

they might decide it's a bad idea for you to join their bloodline.

This is still often the case in Japan.

Japan is still that kind of country.

By bright moonlight

On the tatami mat an ant

The young lady squashes it Her heart makes me feel sad

He wrote this poem after watching what I was doing.

But if an ant walks over the mat, you kill it, don't you?

Otherwise it might sting you!

He was very sensitive.

March 11, 2011.

While exploring the past, I am jolted back into the present.

A massive earthquake shakes the north-east of Japan,

and a tsunami claims the lives of over 18,000 people.

And then, the unimaginable happens.

KEEP OUT

No more Fukushima!

No more Hiroshima!

No more Nagasaki!

No nuclear power plants!

Life is valuable!

No nuclear power plants!

Don't restart the power plants!

No nuclear power plants!

Children are valuable!

Today crowds gathered in Tokyo's Yoyogi park,

summoned by citizen groups, labour unions or via Twitter.

According to the organizers, about 170,000 people showed up.

The Police Department set the number at 75,000.

It was the largest anti-nuclear demonstration

ever to have taken place in Japan.

In his speech, Kenzaburo Oe said it is an insult to the Japanese people

that the government wants to restart nuclear power plants

despite the ongoing crisis.

He said the government's plans had to be scrapped.

Although radioactivity is a well-known health risk,

Japan doesn't want to stop using it.

Radioactivity was used for murder!

And then it was claimed that the war was over.

But by continuing to use radioactivity,

we haven't left the path of death.

I try to protect the tiniest bit of life,

thus protecting Japan in my own way.

But those people want to protect Japan with great power.

Those people guard plutonium

as if it were their most precious treasure.

They can't let go of it.

Because it makes our country powerful.

This plant

is called "Dokudami".

It's an ancient Japanese herbal medicine which boosts the immune system.

Hiroshima survivors made tea from Dokudami

and many who drank it became better.

I'll dry the leaves, chop them, pack them into bags

and send them to Fukushima.

Symptoms are already visible:

diarrhoea, nose bleeding,

inflammation of the gums.

After the nuclear disaster in Fukushima, so-called experts claimed

inner radiation was no great danger,

so everybody should relax and not be scared.

When I hear that, I get extremely angry.

They use big words while knowing nothing.

When radioactive particles poison the water,

contaminate the fields

and enter the human body with food, they radiate the body from the inside.

This is called inner radiation.

In Hiroshima a soldier said to me:

"Doctor, I wasn't in the city on the day of the blast."

He said he was in Osaka that day.

Two days later he returned to Hiroshima and walked the streets.

After a few days he was exhausted and could hardly move.

Four days later I inquired as to his condition.

I asked if he'd already gone home.

I was told he had died.

I just couldn't understand it. He was in Osaka, far from ground zero.

Why had he died of the same symptoms as all the others?

As a doctor, I couldn't understand this at all.

One by one, the people died as a consequence of inner radiation.

DOKUDAMI TEA JUNOD-ASSOCIATION, CHIZUKO UCHIDA

- Hello, Mrs. Uchida. - Hello.

- Here, I brought Dokudami tea. - Oh, really?

Thank you very much.

I think I only left one bag at home.

There are twenty.

Okay. Thank you very much.

Goodbye.

Not only Dokudami but all kinds of fermented foods are good.

It's important to pass on this information.

That's why we donate such things

to refugees in temporary housing, for example.

We were looking for a way to help the radiation victims.

Then our association decided to invite evacuees from Fukushima.

I was asked if some people could stay in my house.

Of course I agreed.

Good morning!

Let's start eating.

Enjoy your meal.

From now on,

people in Fukushima

have to protect themselves.

Because no one will help you

except yourself.

That's 4 mm.

You need to keep your strength up!

I left Fukushima with my son to protect our lives.

But many people who stay in Fukushima want to believe it's safe.

They don't want to hear about the danger.

I've heard people say that if children develop thyroid cancer,

one shouldn't worry too much as thyroid cancer can often be cured.

They say everybody has health insurance,

so children can be treated in hospital.

I felt that insanity was spreading.

Now schools in Fukushima prefecture have started to hand out brochures

claiming that radiation levels are safe.

People are being reassured, rather than warned, about the dangers.

Therefore... I used to have a lot of friends.

But I've lost touch with most of them.

Our feelings are too different.

Most of my friends decided to stay in Fukushima.

Their attitude is different to mine.

What do you think, Mr. Kai, how will Japan be in five years?

Japan...

Well, everyone will be a radiation victim.

There is no doubt about that.

And actually that's a good thing.

- The whole country? - Yes.

It's good provided that we question ourselves

and don't tell any lies.

We have to show the world

what it means to live as radiation victims.

Most importantly,

how we behave

when deformed children are born.

Will we love them and look after them?

Or will we just complain because they are the result of radiation

and treat them like a nuisance?

The question is not what will be, but what we will do.

It is vital that western Japan supports eastern Japan.

We must help the victims.

This is where we stand.

And now I give the floor to Mai Nakata.

Please listen to her story.

When it became clear that reactor number 3 couldn't be saved,

I decided on March 14th to take my son and stay with a friend in Tokyo.

When I told my mother of my plan,

she started to scream and said I was crazy.

My father was still asleep, so she woke him.

She told him I was acting confused and asked him to calm me down.

We had a huge argument and my father even slapped me.

He said I was insane

and trying to abandon my parents.

They simply believe what they see on TV and read in the papers.

Take care!

Thanks!

I don't want my son to stay in Japan.

And I, too, want to leave this country if an opportunity presents itself.

Your grandfather suddenly had an acute liver inflammation.

Although he'd never had liver problems before.

Maybe it was caused by inner radiation.

I would never have considered that before.

But now there's so much information that implicates it.

His liver was extremely inflamed.

His face went dark brown.

He looked so bad that the head nurses gathered to see him.

After a while he started to improve.

But then he suffered several strokes.

One after another.

Maybe due to radiation.

He was too young to become ill.

He was in his late 50s,

in the prime of life.

By the time I was born, my grandfather was already ill.

To me, he was simply my grandfather. A loving old man who spoiled me.

Like everyone else in the family,

I never thought about what had caused the illness.

After almost 30 years, we didn't see the connection to the bomb.

However, radiation sickness can develop decades later.

Since Fukushima this has been discussed in Japan,

which is why my grandmother sees my grandfather's illness in a new light.

September...

No appointments in August. Anyway, it's too hot then.

You said you'd only take appointments till December.

Well, I don't think I can stop this year.

I'll have to continue at least until next March.

Since Fukushima,

you often come across the word "radioactivity".

You hear and read it a lot.

Fukushima's impact will last well beyond three or five years.

Even people who are perfectly healthy now

may develop symptoms later on.

That's what's worrying.

Everyone thinks it's safe to go with the crowd

and to believe whatever the government says.

But in fact, this is the worst way to live your life.

You lose your own will.

Men are particularly guilty.

They might say: "Nuclear plants need to be abolished!"

But in fact they don't do anything. They leave it to their wives.

I'm sorry to say this,

but Japanese men,

myself included,

are the world's worst.

Japanese men are the worst practitioners of democracy in the world.

They understand the theory, but in practice they fail.

They treat their wives as servants

and at home they act like kings. Many men are like that.

They're all talk, no action. Myself included.

I also let my wife take care of me when I'm at home.

Men are raised to act this way.

I'm sorry to say.

Recently I became more self-critical, so I started to prepare the breakfast.

I am well aware that after Fukushima

women are carrying a very heavy load.

And additionally they try hard,

to care for their husbands, their children and their own parents.

Japanese women are raised to always act lovingly.

This may be great for us men

but it isn't for humanity.

Women and men should join forces

and take equal responsibility.

For the sake of our descendants,

we must put out the fire we lit while we are still alive.

Good afternoon!

Mrs. Doi, you are being filmed today.

- Are you nervous? - Not really.

How long have you been shooting?

- I'm a model all the time. - Really?

So, it's routine for you?

- I was wondering if you were okay. - What do you mean?

The state of your health.

I'm fine, but cancer cells are spreading again.

Now that your hair has grown back so nicely...

Mrs. Doi, please hold on to this.

Just a moment. I'll arrange your socks.

I'm very close to my grandmother.

Yet sometimes I feel that I don't really know her.

She has always kept her dreams and desires to herself.

On my visits to Hiroshima

I saw how selflessly she cared for my grandfather.

For twenty years, until his death.

Never did I hear her complain.

Doctor, I'm very old and won't live much longer anyway.

I'd prefer not to do another therapy.

Well, it's not too bad yet.

We can still control it.

In the peace memorial park,

at the front, on the left

some seats are reserved for atomic bomb victims.

We'll sit there.

Please take your seat there.

A Japanese legend holds

that those who fold 1000 paper cranes

are granted a wish by the Gods.

When I was a child, my mother told me the story

of the young girl Sadako.

Nine years after the atomic bomb she suddenly developed leukaemia

and struggled for her life at the Red Cross Hospital.

She folded more than 1000 paper cranes,

but she died nonetheless.

Today, paper cranes symbolize the peace movement

and opposition to nuclear energy.

We want a world free of nuclear weapons,

nuclear power plants and radiation victims!

Restarting power plants is dangerous!

68 years ago

one single bomb

took the lives of 190,000 people.

To those still suffering from the after-effects,

I send out my deepest heartfelt compassion.

I won't take part in such a dishonest ceremony.

They pretend to care for the victims.

But in fact they did nothing to help the people

who came to Hiroshima after the explosion and fell ill.

They said they weren't affected and didn't compensate them.

They shamelessly practise this kind of fake support

and then they come here, pretending to be concerned,

saying that atom bomb victims must be supported.

I can't stand it.

I called them liars and never joined this ceremony.

And now officials in Fukushima are declaring

that the danger has passed.

It's the same as after Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Recently on TV

I saw all the tanks filled with water leaking from the reactors.

There were so many!

All of Japan will soon be covered by them.

And now Abe was re-elected as Prime Minister.

A prime minister who travels abroad promoting nuclear power.

I couldn't stand it!

How could this man possibly protect Japan?

This is absolutely hopeless!

I thought life was not worth living and I got very depressed.

But if I don't speak out, who will?

I had to make an effort.

I decided to continue to share

the little knowledge I have about the atomic bomb.

Otherwise, these people will mislead Japan.

And I got motivated again.

Dr. Hida, what kind of doctor would you be

if you hadn't experienced the atomic bomb?

Well...

I guess more than half of me would be kind of the same.

I can't really compare.

But even if one hasn't experienced the atomic bomb,

seeing so many people struggling on the verge of existence

gradually makes one see things from their perspective.

These are very sad poems.

Summer has gone

Rain keeps drizzling down

In my loneliness I hear my grandchild cry over the phone

You were a baby at that time.

Everything you did was just sweet.

It seems you brought him comfort.

That I am ill I did not believe in my dream

On a spring morning I woke up early

Sometimes

I want to end my life Like in a dream

But I have my wife and I live

He writes that he carried on thanks to me.

That's what he wrote about me.

The last year before his death he did nothing but lie in bed.

We didn't have any conversations anymore.

I just watched him sleep.

I felt very lonely.

And now I'm ill myself...

Life is ironic, isn't it?

"What I told Mai Nakata from Fukushima"

Every other day

I talk to journalists or give a speech in public.

I'm 95 now and very exhausted.

But I can't allow myself to stop.

I'll continue to talk until I break down somewhere.

Today I walked a lot.

I haven't been this hungry in a long time.

Good night, Grandma.

Good night!

I cross the bridge

And my heart fills with peace

Standing awhile on a sand bank where reeds grow