War Orphans Smoking, Ueno 

This photograph, taken the year after the end of World War II, shows two boys. One looks mature for his age, smoking a cigarette, while the other has only an old cloth around his waist. At their feet is an open can with chopsticks, suggesting they have just finished eating. At the time, children who had lost their parents in the war congregated around Ueno Station. Photographer Hayashi Tadahiko chose to photograph Ueno as his first postwar assignment. He recalls that at that time, he had “a feeling of pursuing a small ray of light released from an oppressive society, and an insatiable drive to die in order to live.” Hayashi perhaps sensed an indomitable spirit in these boys, who lived fully and without pessimism about their circumstances.
(OSAWA Sayoko)