I never knew my grandmother. She died before I was born. My dad seldom talked about her, about any of his past…
Here are my grandparents with a child who is probably my aunt, Momoko, circa 1910. They were living in Berkeley, CA around that time. Their eldest child, a son, was with his grandparents back in Japan. The rest of their children, four girls and a boy (my father), were all born in Berkeley. Their home was across the street from the Berkeley Methodist Church on Carleton Street.
I never knew this grandmother. She died before I was born. My dad seldom talked about her, about any of his past. His father died in 1929, when my dad was 11, three years after the family returned to their ancestral home, in Hiroshima.
When my dad returned to San Francisco in 1936, his family remained in Japan. In 1945, his older brother’s family was living with my grandmother. One sister had moved to Hawaii with her Japanese American husband. His other sisters were married and living near their mother.
This is Hiroshima.
I wonder if this is what it looked like from the air, on that morning.
This was the hypocenter of the atomic bomb blast.
Hondori, just to the south of it, is a shopping area where my aunt Misao had a sweet shop.
Hiroshima Jogakuin is where the Sasaki children went to school from 1926-1936. It was 1.2 kilometers from the hypocenter.
On that day, my dad was 27 years old and serving in the U.S. Army. Almost one-third of the students at the school died.
This is Hakushima, the neighborhood where my grandmother lived.
On that morning, she had just walked into the living room clutching a fresh ear of corn which she had been cultivating in the backyard. With the food shortages, an ear of corn was a prize.
“Come look at this corn,” she called to her daughter-in-law and granddaughter, who was home sick from school.
That’s when there was a flash and a tremendous blast. The house came down. My grandmother was pinned under a beam. Her daughter-in-law and granddaughter could hear her voice, but couldn’t get to her. They managed to crawl outside as fire consumed the house.
And so I never had a chance to know my grandmother.
Her name was Sina Aoki Sasaki.
Grateful acknowledgment to my cousin At-chan for willingly sharing painful memories before she died. Maps from Google maps, Map data © 2019. Family images © Sasaki family.
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