Sadako and the Thousand Cranes
| Category: | Perseverance |
|---|---|
| Props: | A folded paper crane, or squares of paper to fold cranes together (optional) |
| Notes: | A true story. Sadako Sasaki was two years old when the atomic bomb fell on Hiroshima in 1945, and died of leukemia in 1955. Good around August 6 (Hiroshima Day), September 21 (International Day of Peace), or for a meeting about hope and courage. Consider folding cranes together afterward. |
There's an old legend in Japan that cranes live for a thousand years. And if you fold a thousand paper cranes, the gods will grant you a wish.
In 1945, at the end of World War Two, an atomic bomb was dropped on the city of Hiroshima, in Japan. A little girl named Sadako Sasaki lived about a mile from where it fell. She was two years old. Somehow, she wasn't hurt.
Sadako grew up healthy and strong. She was the fastest runner in her school. She wanted to be a gym teacher. But in 1955, when she was twelve, she started feeling dizzy and tired, and lumps came up on her neck. The doctors told her she had leukemia, a cancer of the blood. It was caused by the radiation from the bomb, ten years before. They told her family she might have a year to live.
In the hospital, Sadako's best friend brought her a square of gold paper, folded it into a crane, and told her the legend. If you fold a thousand cranes, you get a wish.
So Sadako started folding. She folded cranes from any paper she could find: medicine wrappers, gift wrap, paper from other patients' get-well presents. When she ran out, she folded smaller and smaller ones, some so small she had to use a needle. Her family strung them up on strings across the ceiling of her hospital room. She folded on good days and bad days. When it hurt too much to fold, she rested, and then folded again.
Some versions of the story say Sadako died before she reached a thousand. Her family says she passed a thousand and kept on going, folding more than thirteen hundred. Either way, in October of 1955, Sadako died. She was twelve years old.
Her classmates couldn't stand it. They started raising money for a monument to her, and to all the children who had died because of the bomb. Kids all over Japan sent money. In 1958, the Children's Peace Monument was built in Hiroshima. At the top is a statue of Sadako, holding up a giant golden crane. At the bottom it says: "This is our cry. This is our prayer. Peace in the world."
Today, people from all over the world fold paper cranes and send them to Hiroshima. Millions of them, every year. They hang in strings of a thousand around that statue.
What I think about when I hear Sadako's story isn't the wish. It's the folding. She didn't know if the wish would come true. She kept folding anyway, one crane at a time, on her good days and her bad ones. That's what hope looks like. Not knowing how it'll turn out, and keeping going anyway.
Everybody here will face something hard someday. When you do, remember Sadako. You don't have to fix the whole thing at once. Just fold the next crane.