Remembering Sadako Sasaki; Fukushima today

[will try to get a current pic of Sadako's sculpture in Seattle Peace Park later, in the meantime found this 2011 story. aleks. today's picture added 6 pm].  This is reprinted and picture copied from Magnolia Voice:

Lawton students fold 1,000 cranes

June 13th, 2011 

The Sadako Statue in the University District is now adorned with 1,000 cranes folded by students at Magnolia’s Lawton School.  The students are in Mrs. Ulmer and Ms. Hensley’s class where they read the story of Sadako’s life.  They folded  1,000 cranes in memory of the Japanese earthquake and tsunami.

The statue is located in Peace Park at the corner of N.E. 40th Street and Roosevelt Way N.E. 

About Seattle Peace Park,  from Seattle. Gov: Peace Park was the dream of Dr. Floyd Schmoe, who after winning the Hiroshima Peace Prize in 1998 used the $5,000 prize money to clear a small lot near the University of Washington. From a pile of wrecked cars, garbage, and brush, he worked with community volunteers to build the beautiful Peace Park.

Peace Park is the current home of the Sadako and the Thousand Cranes sculpture, created in 1990 by artist Daryl Smith. The statue is a life-size bronze of Sadako Sasaki, the young Japanese girl who survived the Hiroshima bombing only to die of radiation sickness at age 12.

The park was dedicated on August 6, 1990, the 45th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima.

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• Sadako's story from wikipedia: Sadako Sasaki (佐々木 禎子 Sasaki Sadako, January 7, 1943 – October 25, 1955) was a Japanese girl who was two years old when the atomic bomb was dropped on August 6, 1945, near her home by Misasa Bridge in Hiroshima, Japan. Sadako is remembered through the story of a thousand origami cranes before her death, and is to this day a symbol of innocent victims of war. [...]

•  There is a beautiful 4:40 minutes story about Sadako on youtube by a painter Steve Simon, but somehow cannot be uploaded here, you will find it on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcsKcgEtlNc  or on Steve's 'The Great Peacemakers' webpage. 

Sadako's statue at the Peace Park today, 8/6/13:
Lots of people left origami cranes on her hands and at her feet, also hand-made 'peace'  signs

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• Current news from Fukushima  BBC: 6 August 2013 Last updated at 02:44 ET 
Japan's nuclear watchdog has said the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant is facing a new "emergency" caused by a build-up of radioactive groundwater.

A barrier built to contain the water has already been breached, the Nuclear Regulatory Authority warned.  This means the amount of contaminated water seeping into the Pacific Ocean could accelerate rapidly, it said.

• And here link to Fukushima Diary - - Life in Japan, after 3.11.11 - by Iori Mochizuki,  a civil engineer living in Yokohama.

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How to fold a paper crane for beginners: