Director/producer Michael Dwyer made this 20-minute film featuring Tomiko Morimoto West, a survivor of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima who taught Japanese language courses at Vassar for a decade until she retired in 1994. Both will be available for a Q&A session after the screening.

Tomiko Morimoto West watched from her schoolyard as a low-flying B-29 dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, killing her mother and other family members. Thirteen-year-old Tomiko searched the devastated city for the body of her grandfather to save him the injustice of a mass burial, cremating him under mountain tree branches. She went on to marry an American GI, become a professor at Vassar College, and at age 90 has only one wish: that world leaders work together for global peace.

Michael Dwyer studied film at Bard College and SUNY Purchase. His day gig is as a graphic designer and video production but his heart is tied to art with a mission and social cause. Dwyer has produced three short films, Watch (2003), Rising Tide (2006), and Mom and Pop (2007), which were shown at festivals around the globe, including at Slamdance. Rising Tide won a Silver Medal for short documentary at the 2005 Bilbao Film Festival.

Sponsored by the Asian Studies Program and co-sponsored by the Office of the Dean of the Faculty and the departments of Chinese and Japanese, Film, and Political Science.