Latest news with #GreenLegacyHiroshima
Otago Daily Times
9 hours ago
- General
- Otago Daily Times
Hiroshima ginkgo survived atomic bomb
Yasuda Girls' High School teacher Ayako Ando, of Hiroshima, speaks of the importance of peace and friendship. PHOTOS: SAM HENDERSON Living symbols of peace have taken root at Seacliff. About 30 people gathered at Truby King Recreation Reserve on Saturday to plant a ginkgo tree to mark the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the final days of World War 2. Waikouaiti Coast Community Board chairman Alasdair Morrison began the ceremony with a minute's silence at 11.02am, the exact moment on August 9, 1945, when a plutonium bomb destroyed Nagasaki. "We are here this morning to remember and reflect." Dunedin-Otaru Sister Cities Society secretary Nathan Woodfield, of Dunedin, speaks of the strong bond between the two cities. Yasuda Girls' High School teacher Ayako Ando, visiting with Hiroshima students on a two-week exchange with Otago Girls' High School, spoke of the responsibility to pass on history's lessons to younger generations. Planting the ginkgo was a powerful gesture linking two cities an ocean apart. "I hope this tree will grow tall and strong and that students in this city that pass by it in the future will pause and reflect, not only on Hiroshima's past, but on the hope it represents." Dunedin-Otaru Sister City Society secretary Nathan Woodfield reflected on 45 years of ties with Japan. Waikouaiti Coast Community Board member Mark Brown, of Dunedin, guides others to shovel soil on the base of a newly planted Ginkgo biloba tree grown from seeds of a tree that survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. "As we plant this tree together, a descendant of a tree in Hiroshima that experienced the terrible rays of an atomic bomb, we can together commit to making sure that this tree here never sees such tragedy." After the speeches, people laid soil at the base of the ginkgo, which joined two others already planted in the reserve. All three trees are direct descendants of a Ginkgo biloba that survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. Seeds from this tree were given in 2017 by the Green Legacy Hiroshima initiative to Dunedin Botanic Garden, with support from the Rotary Club of Dunedin Central.
Japan Times
09-08-2025
- General
- Japan Times
A campaign to preserve Hiroshima's historic trees for another 1,000 years
One of humanity's darkest days has yielded seeds of hope. Since 2011, Green Legacy Hiroshima (GLH) has been on a mission 'to safeguard and spread the seeds and saplings of Hiroshima's A-bomb survivor trees worldwide.' The nonprofit currently partners with over 150 organizations around the world to propagate these trees of historical significance. The initiative was dreamt up by two good friends committed to preserving nature and memorializing the past. In February 2011, Nassrine Azimi invited Tomoko Watanabe for a 'brainstorming pasta dinner.' Hailing from Ahvaz, Iran, Azimi had been living in Hiroshima since 2003 and heard lots of stories about the 170 trees that had survived the nuclear blast on August 6, 1945. It was miraculous, Azimi says, 'that the greenery came back (in) this dark, sinister landscape.' While these trees (known as hibakujumoku in Japanese) were documented in the 2008 book 'Survivors: The A-Bombed Trees of Hiroshima' by Mandy Conti and David Petersen, they were not under any governmental or institutional protection. Azimi, now 66, believed she could arrange for their preservation through her work as an advisor for the United Nations Institute for Training and Research (UNITAR), but lacked a network of Hiroshima-based contacts to sustain the project. Enter Watanabe. Azimi was aware that her friend was 'well-known in Hiroshima for her strong grassroots work' in international cooperation and peace education. A native of Hiroshima, Watanabe had childhood memories of walking in the forests 'with my grandmother ... enjoying the smell, the silence, the special atmosphere.' She had kept this connection with nature throughout her life. So when Azimi brought up the hibakujumoku over dinner, a concept began to take shape quite naturally between the two women. As Watanabe puts it, 'Nassrine is like the tree above ground, and I am the roots.' During that life-shaping dinner, the seeds for Green Legacy Hiroshima were sown. GLH would strive to, in Azimi's words, 'protect the trees not individually, but as a coherent whole, like an orchestra.' The organization would use Watanabe's local contacts and Azimi's international connections to grow a global platform for arboreal conservation. The devastating Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011 only escalated Azimi and Watanabe's desire to create an organization to protect these trees and preserve a physical legacy that could long outlive any human. On July 1, 2011, Green Legacy Hiroshima was officially launched. In the last 14 years, GLH, Azimi explains, 'has grown both far more than we imagined, and much less than is necessary.' As of 2025, 41 countries across six continents — from Chile to Norway — have received and planted seeds from the hibakujumoku. GLH remains a volunteer initiative supported in part by UNITAR. Out of respect for the hibakusha (atomic bomb survivors), the organization does not seek to raise funds from the public. Azimi and Watanabe, now 71, work alongside well-known arborist Chikara Horiguchi, whom Azimi calls their 'tree whisperer.' Others currently in GLH's secretariat include Hiroshima-raised Mariko Kikuchi, an expert in UNITAR's Division of Prosperity, and Sophie Qano, a Shansi Fellow from Oberlin College in Ohio. Kikuchi and Qano often refer to the trees as 'survivors' in their own way. 'I've been taught Hiroshima peace education since I was a kid,' says the 27-year-old Kikuchi, 'but didn't know about the trees. ... It should be more publicized that they are survivors, too.' Qano, 24, agrees. 'The trees are so very special because they show this aspect of resilience and peace. ... The hibakusha won't be here forever. The trees are ancient and they have been here for many courses of destruction and conflict.' Unfortunately, the trees are still not protected under the current UNESCO agreement with the Genbaku Dome Heritage site. The clock is already ticking. When Azimi started with GLH, there were 170 trees, but 11 have already died since then. One of them, Watanabe recalls, was a tragic case of miscommunication between the city and prefectural governments. During the G7 Summit in Hiroshima in 2023, prefectural workers were told to cut down certain trees in the vicinity of the summit to prevent snipers. Signs were affixed on each hibakujumoku, indicating that they should be treated as an exception, but the workers were not informed in advance and one of them was still cut down. Watanabe was upset by the incident. 'This is just one example why we need more people to know about the trees,' she says. Azimi hopes UNESCO might decide to extend its protection to the 159 remaining trees by invoking a technical clause. Doing this would help raise the hibakujumoku's international profile and provide national funding, giving GLH a better chance to preserve these trees for centuries to come — maybe even until the year 3025. That's why Azimi refers to GLH as 'the 1,000-year project,' in contrast to the momentary spotlight of anniversaries that people tend to get caught up in. What happened in Hiroshima and Nagasaki must be kept in humanity's memory in perpetuity — this is the guiding principle of GLH and its volunteers. Trees, like us, are mortal. The closest tree to the epicenter of the bombing (370 meters away) is a Salix babylonica, or weeping willow. Given optimal care, this tree can live up to 100 years; its shoots may pass on its legacy across millennia. When the first atomic bomb detonated close to the nearby Aioi Bridge, the force of the blast broke apart the tree's trunk. In 1947, while surveying the apocalyptic scene of scorched rubble, Hiroshima mayor Shinzo Hamai found hope in how, despite such thorough devastation, nature still found a way to push through the dark shadows of war, the tree's trunk having already sprouted. In the late spring of 1947, Hamai listened to the demands of Hiroshima residents who'd 'finally started to wake up from their state of collapse.' They told Hamai that they wanted a peace festival so that they could 'tell their experience to the whole world.' Hamai urged caution, fearful that Hiroshima would become a 'laughingstock' or a city unreasonably focused on an impossible ideal. But, as Hamai put it in a recording discovered in 2019 by his family, 'The citizens weren't satisfied (with my call for caution). They said, 'Do it anyways, and fix things along the way.'' Hamai was impressed with their resolve. 'They believed it was their mission to hold this peace ceremony.' On August 6, 1947, the first peace ceremony in Hiroshima was held. Crowds of thousands can be seen in the historical photographs. Nearby stand the hibakujumoku. Damaged, but alive. They, like the people around them, had survived.
Montreal Gazette
02-07-2025
- Health
- Montreal Gazette
Letters: 28 Years Later offers lessons in humanity
The poster for the film 28 Years Later features what appear to be hundreds of human skulls stacked in a pyramid. Presumably, these are skulls of those who have fallen to the 'rage virus' first introduced in 28 Days Later in 2002. But this third instalment in the series is about far more than incredibly disturbing sequences of bloody mayhem. Surprisingly, characters like Dr. Kelson, played by Ralph Fiennes, have many poignant lessons to teach us about humanity. Physicians should watch this movie because it shows how to communicate with a patient in a respectable way. Politicians should watch it because it proves that beauty in the world trumps the ugliness of war. And people in general should enjoy it for the perfectly balanced action and horror tempered by genuine moments of affection. Nathan Friedland, Roxboro Sowing the seeds of peace We must be grateful to Allison Hanes for her column about the tragedy of genocide and mass killings and for shedding light on Heidi Berger's work in genocide education. Instead of subscribing to war, let us follow the inspiring example of the Green Legacy Hiroshima organization, which has distributed, worldwide, the seeds and saplings of trees that survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. These trees have served as an inspiration for the rebirth of Hiroshima and are considered trees of peace. Montreal and Hiroshima are sister cities, and saplings from a surviving ginkgo biloba tree were planted in Montreal in 2018 in the name of peace. Let us plant trees instead of killing people with bombs. Shloime Perel, Côte-St-Luc Education is key to disease prevention In the 1950s, '60s and '70s, parents had their children vaccinated against serious and highly communicable diseases such as tuberculosis, polio and measles, for their own health and for society at large. Many parents today are ignorant of the harm such diseases cause or are misinformed about the safety and effectiveness of vaccines. We need to better educate people about the science and importance of disease prevention and ensure all children are vaccinated against any communicable disease before they enter the school system. We do not want to repeat the tragic past of children dying from preventable diseases. Mary Armstrong, Montreal Call for vigilance in Côte-St-Luc Re: ' Côte-St-Luc mayor proposes measures Montreal could take to help Jewish community feel safer ' (The Gazette, June 10) As a resident of Côte-St-Luc, it was reassuring to read that our mayor, Mitchell Brownstein, urged Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante to take immediate action in response to rising security concerns for the Jewish community. Since Hamas's Oct. 7, 2023 attack on Israel, there has been a spike in antisemitic incidents. In response to this grave situation, Brownstein proposed several measures Plante could take, including the creation of buffer zones around vulnerable locations. He also appealed to citizens to be vigilant and report anything suspicious. We all have a civic duty to protect our freedom and security. Vivianne M. Silver, Côte-St-Luc Submitting a letter to the editor Letters should be sent by email to letters@ We prioritize letters that respond to, or are inspired by, articles published by The Gazette. If you are responding to a specific article, let us know which one. Letters should be sent uniquely to us. The shorter they are — ideally, fewer than 200 words — the greater the chance of publication. Timing, clarity, factual accuracy and tone are all important, as is whether the writer has something new to add to the conversation. We reserve the right to edit and condense all letters. Care is taken to preserve the core of the writer's argument. Our policy is not to publish anonymous letters, those with pseudonyms or 'open letters' addressed to third parties. Letters are published with the author's full name and city or neighbourhood/borough of residence. Include a phone number and address to help verify identity; these will not be published. We will not indicate to you whether your letter will be published. If it has not been published within 10 days or so, it is not likely to be.
Otago Daily Times
19-06-2025
- General
- Otago Daily Times
Living symbols of peace
A gingko bilboa tree grown from a seed from a "hibaku tree" - a tree that survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima in 1945. Several such trees have been raised by Dunedin Botanic Garden and will be planted in Dunedin as well as distributed to different centres. In 2017, the Rotary Club of Dunedin Central approached the Dunedin Botanic Garden to be a partner in a Green Legacy Hiroshima, Ceremonial Peace Trees project. The garden was asked to grow 25 ginkgo biloba trees for planting around Dunedin and Otago. Green Legacy Hiroshima was established to safeguard and spread the seeds and saplings of Hiroshima's ''hibaku trees'' — trees that survived the atomic blasts of August 6, 1945. This is a global volunteer campaign. Seeds and saplings from the A-bomb survivor trees are growing in 40 countries. Green Legacy sends seeds only to institutional partners, such as universities and botanical gardens that can commit to the long-term care of the trees. Seeds were collected by Hiroshima Botanical Garden from below the parent tree at Tsuruhane Shrine in November 2016. The female tree, inside the temple grounds, is 1810m from the hypocentre of the blast. Having recovered, it is now 18m tall with a trunk circumference of 2.67m, and is producing plenty of seed. In 2017, the Botanic Garden received 30 seeds. These were sown in deep pots with a combination of seed-raising mix and perlite and kept in the glasshouse on a heated mist bench. By late October, 25 seeds had germinated. Each year since, the trees have been potted up and grown on and 23 trees were ready for planting in 2024. One tree was planted in the Market Reserve and others have been given to the Truby King Reserve, the Oamaru Botanic Garden and the Christchurch Botanic Garden. The Dunedin Botanic Garden has planted a grove of the trees in the arboretum area near the northern cemetery. These trees will provide a living symbol of peace. — Alice-Lloyd Fitt
BBC News
18-06-2025
- Science
- BBC News
Seeds from Hiroshima ‘survivor trees' growing at Keele University
Seeds from two trees that survived the atomic bomb attack on Hiroshima at the end of World War Two are being grown at a Staffordshire seeds were collected from an oriental plane tree in the grounds of the Tenma Elementary School, which was destroyed by the bombing, and a 200-year-old ginkgo tree growing in Shukkeien Garden. Both trees were situated less than a mile from the bomb site on 6 August 1945 and miraculously survived the will now be cared for by experts at Keele University until they become tall and sturdy enough to be planted in the ground. The university says it is part of an international project to promote peace and hope. The seeds were sent to Keele through the Green Legacy Hiroshima initiative, which aims to distribute seeds and saplings from 'survivor trees' Sarah Taylor, a lecturer in ecology at Keele, said: "It is a great honour to have the opportunity to nurture seeds from trees that survived the Hiroshima bombing."Now that we have the seeds, we can begin quite a long painstaking process of propagation and nurturing. The seeds will be sown onto compost and kept in heated plant propagators until signs of germination appear." She added: "The seedlings will need to be nurtured for several years before they are large enough to plant on the university campus, where we hope they will be a source of reflection and inspiration for a long time."Although they are tiny right now, they are still very powerful symbols of peace and hope and have so much history connected to them. It's going to be exciting to see the first green shoots rise from the earth."Keele is the 19th UK partner of the Green Legacy Hiroshima initiative. The project was brought to the attention of the University's arboretum committee by Franco Castro Escobar, following his postgraduate research trip to Hiroshima in the summer of Escobar said: "Keele has a special connection with Japan through the collection of cherry trees that we have on our campus, and this project will build on that relationship." Follow BBC Stoke & Staffordshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
