Before we arrived in Hiroshima for a short visit 18 months ago, I really didn’t know what to expect.

I was familiar enough with its history to know that August 6, 1945, was a terrible day in world history; that an ancient city had been obliterated in a matter of seconds during a time of great global madness and that thousands of innocents had lost their lives.

Once there, of course, I observed that Hiroshima had risen from its ashes and become a thoroughly modern city with a mission — to spread the message of peace.

This image taken of the sun rising behind the Chugoku mountains in the land of the rising sun reminds me that every day is a renaissance from the dark age of night. Over several decades Hiroshima has crawled from the depths of its own very dark age to shine as the bustling city it is today.

And now, a year since the horrifying earthquake and tsunami that devastated Fukishima and surrounding areas, a country once again in crisis slowly starts a complicated, but hope-filled renaissance.

It is a renaissance we watch with interest. The fallout of what also became a nuclear event affects us all at some level, and some people more than others. In a world shrunken by the Internet and social media we are more connected than ever — in mind, body and spirit, and by the fallout this event is having on the planet we share.

It’s not just Japan struggling to rise from this dark night, we are all in this together.

It is worth remembering that the sun that rises over Hiroshima rises over us all.

Copyright Aimwell Enterprises 2012