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TANAKA Kiyoko(TANAKA Kiyoko) 
Gender Female  Age at time of bombing 14 
Recorded on 2013.10.6  Age at time of recording 82 
Location at time of bombing Hiroshima(Direct exposure Distance from the bombing hypocenter:4.7km) 
Location when exposed to the bombing Kusatsu-honmachi, Hiroshima City [Current Nishi-ku,Hiroshima City] 
Status at time of bombing High school or university student 
Occupational status at time of bombing  
Hall site Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall for the Atomic Bomb Victims 
Dubbed in English/
With English subtitles
With English subtitles 

TANAKA Kiyoko, (82) at the time of exposure to the radiation, she was 14 years old. She was exposed to the radiation at Kusatsu-hon-machi which was 4.7 km away from the epicenter. Crying, she was evacuated with her friend to a suburb of Hiroshima. She was shocked at the sight of the meeting place for people searching for family members in which every room was full of dead bodies. She couldn't give water to the people who suffered from burns although they were pleading for water. She still regrets this even now.  Water is the most precious thing. She says it is the source of our lives.
 
[The lunch box her mother bought for her]
My father was a soldier and was away so he was not at home. I was so young that I don't remember when he went away. I, my younger brother, and my mother were living in a small rented house. I cannot forget how happy I was when my mother bought me a lunch box for the first time. I began to go to school. The school, Hiroshima Practical Girls High School, was a bit too far and I couldn't go back home for lunch. That's why my mother bought the lunch box for me.
 
There was no special food inside. A lot of barley mixed with some rice, pickled plums, vegetables, and something boiled, salted cod roe spiced with red pepper my mother had bought somewhere. She sometimes put those rare foods in the lunch box. If someone had no lunch one day, another person went to a corner of the school ground and they sat there together, and shared his or her lunch with chopsticks broken in half. And they came back to their classroom after other students finished their lunch. There were students like this. Not in all classes but in some classes there were about 5 such students who gave their lunch to their close friends.
 
We were always hungry and if we complained, we were scolded with the word, "remember soldiers." Patience, patience. We were told not to complain until we would win the war. Even if I said I wanted a something small, I was never given even that. The lunch box was the only item my mother bought me which gave me hope. That's why I treated it with great care. My mother said to me, "it became so old. Throw it away," but I could not do that.
 
[6th August]
In the morning, Mr. Sakanoue, who always visited my younger brother, came to our house. I said, "Mr. Sakanoue has arrived," and my younger brother appeared with my mother, and said, "I will take a day off because I have a stomachache." I parted with Mr. Sakanoue then and went to the house of Ms. Kikue Sagawa, a friend of mine. I walked to Koi-machi and took a street car bound for Miyajima. We couldn't go to school wearing white uniforms at that time. That's why there was a place where they dyed our uniforms khaki colored. Kiku-chan said, "I want to go there to pick up my uniform on the way to school, and would like you to come with me." I was reluctant but decided to go with her.
 
An intense light flashed around Kusatsu, I thought a cannon ball had hit the sun. "Oh dear! Let's get away, Kiku-chan," I said. Everyone went down on the ground together and then stood up and ran away. I don't remember well what the sound or the wind were like. When I looked up a few minutes after the blast, I saw a black circle in the sky. And I remember one more thing; I don't know if it was above or under the circle but a white circle appeared and flashed for a few seconds, I'm not sure. We were surprised at that and tried to run away, but we didn't know how we could get away. I didn't know where I was. I think anyone knew that either.
 
Kiku-chan said, "I'll go back to Hiroshima," but I said, "even if you go back to Hiroshima, there would be no place to sleep, as houses in Kusatsu are all crashed down like these. Those in Kannon-cho must be the same." I can take care of you and we can escape together, so follow me," I told her. Though Kiku-chan said "no." I knew I could go to my aunt's house in Miyajima-guchi if I followed along the railways, I ran on a path along the railway. We were crying aloud. All the girls were crying.  We got away saying "help us, help us."
 
[Victims we met at Hatsukaichi Station]
So many people ran away but there was no one in Hatsukaichi Station. That's why we thought everyone had already fled. We found a man when we went out of the station. When we looked at him, we could not make out his eyes and hands which were a sticky mass. I don't remember where I got it but I happened to have a rice ball. I said to him, "would you like to eat this," and put the rice ball on his palm. The man said, "I don't need the rice ball. Please give me water." Because the rice ball could not enter his mouth, he couldn't eat any of it. He was in the condition that we didn't know where his mouth was.
 
All the parts of his body were swollen and his eyes were closed and swollen too, and all the skin on his face was stuck together. He could not fully open his mouth. All of his five fingers were stuck to each other and became one.His clothes were all torn up and I later wondered how he could have sat there like that. All he could do was just sit there. I think he would soon collapse. So I put the rice ball there.  We ran to the meeting place in Jigozen, where we were supposed to go crying and saying, "father, mother."
 
[My younger brother rescued my mother]
Just after the bomb fell, my younger brother was on the roof of our house. My younger brother was lying on one mattress with my mother under a mosquito net. And when he looked around, he found himself on the tiles of the roof. He thought it was strange because his mother must be there with him and he turned over the tiles. He found his mother's face and a big round board was on her chest there then. As a fire had broken out around the entrance and it was approaching her, he had to rescue her. He had to bring some water and pour it on the fire. We had some water reserved for fires at that time in every detached house. My younger brother went there to draw water with a bucket.
 
My younger brother just entered elementary school then and could not pour so much water at one time. He poured a half a bucket of water each time. But the flames were too strong and had no effect. No one was around to help. Many of the soldiers had fled. Neighbors and many strangers ran away as well. He called out "please help my mother" but it was useless. His mother said, "you can see your sister at your aunt's place in Miyajima-guchi. Go there." "I can't get away. Run away immediately." My younger brother seeing his mother's face said, "I can't go away alone. No, I'll stay and help you." My younger brother did his best.
 
It seemed strange but I actually pictured my younger brother doing his best to rescue our mother, at the same time I was fleeing to Miyajima-guchi with Kiku-chan. I could see my younger brother who said, "I have to pour water on my mother and pull her out soon." When I first heard the story of my brother, I found that my vision matched with what happened. This experience had me believe in God even if some people say there is no God in this world.
This kind of thing happens. I could see my younger brother whom I could never see because I was in Hatsukaichi-cho.
 
[The meeting place in which we found the piles of dead bodies]
I was horrified when I went to the meeting place in Jigozen. It was relatively quiet there but we found a lot of dead people when we entered a classroom. A person who was barely breathing said, "my elder sister, give me some water." There was no one who was in good condition like us. We felt ashamed because our wounds were not serious at all. We said, "I'm sorry, we have no water," and moved through the corridor. There were only dead people and dying people in all the corridors and classrooms of the school.
 
We went to each classroom one by one and finally found the one in which our neighborhood group should be. I was called, "Kiyo-chan," for the first time after the blast and felt alive again.
I don't remember whether she was the woman from the liquor shop or someone else but the person called me, and I was asked, "are all your family members all right?" I said, "I'm all right but don't know if my younger brother and mother are well or not because we are supposed to meet at the house of my aunt near Chichiyasu, a dairy product maker." I don't know if everyone in our family is alright or not. The woman said for us, "good, you are lucky because you are all right, good." "You are also lucky, Kiku-chan." But Kiku-chan seemed lonely because she still didn't see any of her brothers or sisters. I cheered her up saying, "let's look for your family from now. You are alright as you can see your father or someone." We were girls and what we could do was only cry.
 
There was a large room and it was very quiet there. We wondered if everyone there was sleeping or what they were doing and went in together. When we entered the room, we were so horrified because there was a pile of dead bodies. I didn't know what to say. I said, "Kiku-chan, these are all dead bodies, let's go down. I'm scared." I became terrified when I stood there. And we went to the next room hoping it was different from the one we saw. But it was the same, piles of dead bodies. We were so frightened by the sight. But we didn't know what t do.
 
[The reunion with Kiku-chan's father]
There was a building like a shrine in the back of the school. A tall tree was there and a tall man was standing alone beside the tree. We found that the person was Kiku-chan's father. "Kiku-chan, your father is here. He is your father," I said. Kiku-chan were surprised and ran to her father. Her father was also delighted saying, "Kikue, you are lucky."
 
I said to Kiku-chan's father, "I will take full responsibility and bring Kiku-chan to my aunt's house and put her up for the night," "Please find your wife or children." And "I will have her come here in the early morning tomorrow." I said to Kiku-chan, "please live happily together with your father from now on." I said so and parted with Kiku-chan's father.
 
[The reunion with my family members at my aunt's house]
When we went to my aunt's house, my mother and younger brother were also there. Many pieces of glass were embedded in the neck of my younger brother and he couldn't turn his head. He hated for anyone to pull out these shards of glass so remained embedded. My aunt was delighted that we were the only family in our town whose family members all survived. She was a very pleasant aunt. I said to her, "aunty, I brought a friend. Please let her stay with me tonight." Staying over doesn't mean sleeping on a mattress but just sitting inside the house.
 
Much later that night, the eldest son of the aunt came home. He was burned all over his body. He said he was looking up the sky when getting off a train at Hiroshima Station wondering if a B-29 would come. Then, there was a flash of light, and he got burned all over. All of his flesh was hanging down and he was crying all night saying, "mother, it hurts, it hurts." I said to Kiku-chan, "let's go out and see the city of Hiroshima."
 
Seeing what the city of Hiroshima looked like, I said, "there might not be a place to sleep when we go back to Hiroshima." "The city of Hiroshima is burning like that." "The city will be burning all night tonight. Here is a strange place but nothing like that has happened here." We went back to my aunt's house saying so. If I have some water, I want to bring it and pour it and would like to give some to someone. I think this is why everyone asked for water. Why I couldn't give them water even if they desperately wanted water. I also regretted this.
 
[The importance of water and peace]
Whatever we make, we can't do that without water. All plants and animals can't live without water. Even if we make a weapon with which we can destroy an enemy country, the origin of this is just a drop of water. I think water gets angry because we don't treat it as water. If we drink water as a tasty thing, then this is fine. But if we use water for atomic bombs or scientific weapons which can kill so many people, where do we throw dead people or polluted things? We are polluted again with the toxic substances which we throw away.
 
I think researchers should treat a drop of water with care and can begin their work from a drop of water. I think something like scientific weapons are produced because they do their research wasting a drop of water. I would like them not to underrate water and to treat even a drop of water with care. Water is the most precious source of our lives. I believe so.
 
Planning and copyright:Hiroshima National Peace Memorial Hall for the Atomic Bomb Victims  Production: Aeras
Translation: Seminar Class in Kyoto University of Foreign Languages in 2018
Supervisors: SHONAKA Takayuki and Paul D. Scott Translation Coodinator: NET-GTAS  (Network of Translators for the Globalization of the Testimonies of Atomic Bomb Survivors)

*Many more memoirs can be viewed at both the Hiroshima and Nagasaki Peace Memorial Halls.
*These contents are updated periodically.
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