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I\u2019m raising a camellia sapling.<\/p>\n
When I first received it three years ago \u2014 a goodbye present from a former job \u2014 the camellia was just a spindly little thing, with no more than eight leaves stuck to its single, twig-like trunk. After about a year, it put out its first branch. Then, the following spring, suddenly another five burst forth in the span of just a few weeks. It must have been preparing them all winter.<\/p>\n
At first, I kept the camellia on my windowsill. In time, it managed to press some of its leaves flat against the glass, trying to soak up as much sunlight as possible. Following its growth spurt, the camellia\u2019s pot was clearly too small, but I kept putting off replanting it.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019ll be a pain to carry a big pot when I move to Tokyo,\u201d I thought, guiltily pretending I didn\u2019t see the roots poking out of the bottom.<\/p>\n
In fact, this isn\u2019t just any camellia: Its \u201cmother\u201d survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. That makes my sapling a second-generation survivor tree. But although I lived in Hiroshima for a few more years after receiving the camellia, I never paid its mother a visit, or even checked where she might be. I decided it was past time to do so.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s a label stuck in the camellia\u2019s pot: \u201cA-bombed camellia, W14b29-01.\u201d The number contains information about the mother tree \u2014 \u201cW14\u201d for 1,400 meters west of ground zero, \u201cb\u201d meaning that it\u2019s been replanted, \u201c29-01\u201d for its location and number of survivor trees at that site.<\/p>\n
But the label was wrong. When I cross-checked it against a database compiled by Hiroshima City, \u201cW14b29-01\u201d was a jujube, not a camellia. I visited the tree\u2019s location, on the green belt that sandwiches Peace Boulevard, to double check. Yes, the jujube\u2019s leaves were totally different from my camellia. I consulted the city\u2019s database again, this time for A-bombed camellia japonica<\/em>. Luckily, there was only one.<\/p>\n It grows at Yoshijima Inari Shrine in Hiroshima City\u2019s Naka Ward, 2,160 meters from ground zero. The shrine wasn\u2019t large, but its grounds contained another three survivor trees in addition to the camellia: a sinewy hackberry, an elegant pine, and a stately camphor.<\/p>\n According to the city\u2019s database, these trees protected the shrine building from the atomic bomb\u2019s blast, and injured were treated on the shrine grounds in the following days.<\/p>\n Curious to learn more about the mother camellia, I emailed an arborist who has taken care of Hiroshima\u2019s survivor trees for many years. He told me that the camellia was about 120 years old, and that it had been purchased by the shrine from a gardener in Koimachi, on the western side of Hiroshima city.<\/p>\n Although I had hoped to speak with someone at the shrine as well, the facilities were smaller than I expected and deserted. But I spotted the camellia right away, next to the stone gate that marks the entrance to the shrine.<\/p>\n The A-bombed camellia hangs over a sign pointing to parking for a local public bath.<\/p>\n \n It leaned northward at a steep angle, and there were scars near its base where parts of the trunk had rotted away. Propped up by a few wooden posts, the tree looked rather like it was using canes to support a bad leg.<\/p>\n But it\u2019s impossible to say for sure whether these features are effects of the atomic bomb. The arborist had also told me of another potential effect from radiation: a mottled pattern on the camellia’s leaves. Yes, I could see splotches of yellow. (My sapling also exhibits some speckles, but I don\u2019t know whether it\u2019s genetic or whether I just don\u2019t give it enough plant food.)<\/p>\n Despite the tilting trunk and splotchy leaves, the camellia\u2019s branches were full of fruit. A mother tree indeed.<\/p>\n Hiroshima\u2019s survivor trees mean various things to various people. Many hibakusha (A-bomb survivors) have spoken about finding hope in the fresh green shoots that grew from charred trunks in the bombed-out city. \u201cMaybe I can go on living too,\u201d they thought. And for years, Hiroshima City and civil society groups have sent second-generation seeds and saplings around the world as symbols of peace.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/tansa-en.test-server.world\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/08\/tsubaki-mom-1024x768.jpg\")
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