The paper cranes which our children made with all their along with their best wishes for peace, can be seen hanging from the Children's Monument for Peace in Hiroshima Memorial Park. With such a lovely gesture, the School has lent support to the Sadako Sasaki legend and its one thousand origami cranes, a symbol of a desire for international peace and a wish that the Hiroshima y Nagasaki holocausts, should never happen again.
According to an old Japanese legend, if you make one thousand origami cranes, your greatest wish will come true. The crane is the japanese symbol for peace and origami, a way of folding paper into many different forms, is a very old tradition in this country. The tradition of paper cranes in the fight for Peace goes back to the II World War and the story of the little girl Sadako Sasaki, one of the victims of the atomic bomb. She was only 2 years old when the Horoshima bombings took place and 9 years later, she developed leukaemia as a result of nuclear radiation.
Thinking that the folded paper cranes would help her to heal, Sadako began to fold and fold them, right up to the end. She died on the 25th of October, 1955, after eight months of fighting the disease, having not yet finished the task. Sadako's death led to a campaign to build a monument of prayer for world peace, as well as a peaceful resting place for many children killed by the atom bomb. Later, this story spread around the World and now there are around 10 million cranes made each year and laid before the Children's Monument for Peace.
And amongst those millions of cranes which arrive every year, will be those of our own students. Full of wishes for peace and in favour of a better World, without nuclear weapons, so that no child is, ever again, a victim of War.