Despite a sudden downpour during the morning portion of Wednesday\u2019s ceremony, the 6th annual Tinian Hiroshima Nasaki Peace Ceremony went well, an event organizer said. <\/p>\n
The ceremony honored the 63rd anniversary of the Enola Gay taking off from Tinian. The aircraft carried \u201cLittle Boy,\u201d the atomic bomb used in the attack on Hiroshima. <\/p>\n
Approximately 60 people took part in the morning activities, comprised mostly of students from Tinian High School and Koryo High School, and 50 in the evening.<\/p>\n
During the Sounding of the Sirens at 9am and moment of silence, the downpour started, event organizer James Mendiola said. <\/p>\n
\u201cActually, it made for a poignant moment,\u201d he said. \u201cIt maybe underscored the sadness of the event.\u201d<\/p>\n
The organizers decided to move the event from the Children\u2019s Peace Monument to the Kammer Beach main pavilion before the ceremony due to the weather forecast for rain, he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt actually worked out very well,\u201d Mendiola added. <\/p>\n
Erica Evangelisa served as the master of ceremony for the morning portion and evening vigil. She conducted the ceremony in English and Japanese to benefit the visiting students and teachers from Japan.<\/p>\n
A one-minute moment of silence was observed at 9:15am while sirens from the Tinians\u2019 Department of Public Safety vehicles sounded. A multi-faith prayer followed the moment of silence. Sister Luz from the Catholic Church, Vili A. Villan of the Seventh-Day Adventist, and Pastor Buddy Cunanan of Jesus is Lord conducted the prayers. <\/p>\n
A less formal Candlelight Peace Vigil started in the evening. Participants helped light nearly 300 candles decorating the main pavilion. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt made for a very intimate moment,\u201d Mendiola said. <\/p>\n
The 13 students from Hiroshima Koryo High School performed a Japanese song, Peace Loving People, while the Tinian Children\u2019s Choir performed John Lennon\u2019s Imagine. Tinian High School student Alisha Shrestha recited an original poem, Peace, written for the ceremony. <\/p>\n
Local recording artists Anthony Aguon and Nikita Mendiola closed the ceremony by performing U2\u2019s One and Marvin Gaye\u2019s What\u2019s Going On.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt wowed everyone. It actually wrapped things up quite nicely,\u201d Mendiola said. <\/p>\n
After the event, vigil participants enjoyed refreshments provided by community members. <\/p>\n
\u201cI think it was a nice ceremony this year. Although it was small, I think the candles and music were something special, and I hope our guests from Hiroshima enjoyed the event.\u201d said Ann Marie Hocog, one of the organizers of the event. \u201cAnd we would especially like to thank the many people and businesses that had donated so much to this year\u2019s events; without their help none of this would have been possible.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Despite a sudden downpour during the morning portion of Wednesday\u2019s ceremony, the 6th annual Tinian Hiroshima Nasaki Peace Ceremony went well, an event organizer said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-125110","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125110"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125110\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}