Chaos and Kanji: Take a Look Back at 1940s Tokyo!

Do you know what today is?

August 15, 1945 (August 14 in the US) is when World War II ended. August 6th and 9th were the dates America dropped the two atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, respectively.

These dates really meant nothing to me living in America - yes, I definitely learned about them in history class, but Pearl Harbor and D-Day are the most memorable events as taught to me in school. And while there's no talk here of Pearl Harbor, every year I hear about the bombs in early August.

While I'm on the topic, the master recording of the Japanese surrender was just officially released last month; you can listen to a copy below in a video from 2011:

Japan managed to get back on its feet and running soon after, and a DJ named Boogie Belgique has used a bunch of footage of Tokyo in the late 1940s to make the "music video" seen below:

The video shows Shimbashi, Shibuya, and other areas of Tokyo somewhere around 1946-1948. The music itself is okay but I really enjoyed taking a look at how this now-packed city appeared after the war.

2 comments:

FujiAugust 15, 2015 at 9:59 PM
Great post. Interesting that they don't talk about Pearl Harbor much over there. It's kinda like how elementary school students learn a skewed version of topics like Christopher Columbus and the treatment of Native Americans.
Ryan GAugust 17, 2015 at 7:04 AM
I'm not sure how much they learn in school, but my Japanese students seem to be well aware of the "blame" in WW2. Schools and society work hard to instill a philosophy of peace and harmony with the world, which I can really see in the responses I get from adults when we do talk about war. At the same time, they are wary of North Korea and aware of hostility towards Japan in Asian countries.