wall of hope

since june i've been hearing about a missing kid named kyron horman.

a 7 year old boy from portland oregon.

he went missing from his elementary school while in the care of his stepmother.

then i moved to portland and since then, it's everywhere.  posters, signs, flyers, billboards and non-stop news on the story.

i kept hearing about the "wall of hope" that people began at his elementary school.  so i decided to check it out.

the school is in the country.  surrounded by cows and barns and fields.

the school and the wall are hard to miss.

people from all over have written messages and left gifts.

someone began leaving origami cranes there.

the origami crane has a huge importance in japan and it is tradition to fold 1000 cranes to wish long life, prosperity and good health.

i remember when i went to hiroshima in japan and visiting the memorial park and seeing thousands of them on statues.  they are colorful and quite moving.  the cranes were begun by a 2 year old japanese girl named sadako who believed if she folded 1000 cranes she would be cured.  but she died from the results of radiation poisoning at the age of 12 from the bomb.

hopefully they will work for kyron.