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| The Seattle Community gathering in front of the Kobe Bell in Seattle Center |
On Saturday, May 19, 2011, over 400 people in the Seattle community and Washington leaders gathered at Seattle Center in front of the Kobe Bell to commemorate the victims of the Great Tohoku Earthquake earlier this month.
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| Emcee Ms. Lori Matsukawa of King5 News |
Some Washington leaders and community representatives made remarks including: Seattle Consul General of Japan Kiyokazu Ota, Washington Governor Christine Gregoire , Congressman Jim McDermott and Seattle Deputy Mayor Darryl Smith with King 5 News anchor Ms. Lori Matsukawa as the emcee.
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| Reverend Taijo Imanaka of the Seattle Koyasan Buddhist Temple |
Reverend Taiji Imanaka of the Seattle Koyasan Buddhist Temple led a prayer in English and Japanese honoring those who perished from the earthquake and tsunami.
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| Washington Governor Christine Gregoire |
There were three charities collecting donations for the Japan Earthquake and Tsunami Relief. They were the American Red Cross, Peace Winds America, and the YMCA.Currently donations for the Japan Disaster Relief from Washington State have reached over 7 million dollars. Governor Gregoire stressed how she would like to see the donations double that amount and urged people to make donations if possible.
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| One after another the community leaders and elected officials led by Reverend Imanaka paid their respects and rang the Kobe Bell. |
Since becoming sister cities in 1957, Seattle and Kobe have exchanged many gifts of friendship over the years. The Kobe Bell, or Friendship Bell in Seattle Center was a gift from the City of Kobe to its sister city of Seattle to commemorate their friendship and the 1962 World's Fair. In return for this gift, the City of Seattle gave the City of Kobe a totem pole as a symbol of the Pacific Northwest and the cultures within.
The Kobe Bell has become a location of solidarity to the Seattle Japanese community in times of crisis. In the Great Hanshin-Awaji (Kobe) Earthquake of 1995, people gathered there to remember those that were lost.
In Kobe there is a moment of silence to respect and remember the people that were lost every January 16 at 5:45AM. The Seattle Kobe Sister City Association continue this tradition along side Kobe meeting at 12:45PM to join in the moment of silence, currently this tradition has reached its 16th year.
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| Many thanks to the volunteers working that day to collect donations and messages for the victims of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan. |
