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Day 6 - We invade Hiroshima
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Checked out of the Gimmond Hotel, and caught the subway to Kyoto train station, and got on the 7:50am super-express Shinkansen bound for Hiroshima, which headed through Osaka, Kobe (famous for the beef), Himeji (which we will be coming back to in a week or so) and a few other smaller towns. Overall it was just short of a 2 hour trip. Not real pleasant, as it was pretty much fully booked.
When we arrived in Hiroshima station we followed the World Friendship Centre guidelines and took a tram (or "street-car" as they are known here) from the station, through the peace park, and got off at a stop a few blocks from the hotel. Walked the rest of the way and found the friendship centre with no worries. It is basically an old Japanese house which has been converted into lodging for about 4 different rooms. We have the entire bottom floor to ourselves, including the only air conditioner in the place, and basically we have 2 rooms joined into one.
The only other guy on the ground floor with us is some poor British bastard who is sleeping on a mat in the kitchen because the place is overbooked. He didn't sound real happy about it when I asked him about it either. The friendship centre is run by a couple of American ex-pats pushing the anti-nuclear love-each-other hug-the-dasies message. But they seem nice enough. For Americans. Actually I'm half convinced they are half nuts, as they are running this place on a 2 year volunteer tenure, all because they think they are making a difference to the anti-nuke effort. To confirm my suspicions that they are slightly nuts, when we got there our rooms weren't quite made up, so we asked if there was a coffee shop nearby, possibly with a park for the girls.
Instead of telling us where one was, Sarah, our hostess, showed us the way to a park a few blocks away, and then said that she would bring coffee down to us! Veronica and I looked at each other in disbelief (it was still 30 degrees outside) but couldnt really say no. She asked how Veronica had her coffee, and Veronica said white with 2, her first response was "2 what?". Then, unsurprisingly we had to explain that white mean't with milk. So off we trekked to the park, and 10 minutes later the poor guy came walking down with the coffee, a jug of milk, sugers, cutlery and biscuits on a tray. The woman had sent her poor husband out in the heat to carry the coffee tray several blocks to us. A lovely gesture though that we just would not have got had we stayed at a hotel.
After we got back we decided to go for a walk to the peace park, which was about 1km away. One thing we were told by our hosts, which we noticed was very true while walking to the peace park, was that since the bomb, the rebuild of Hiroshima has included a massive number of parks, and treelined nature walks and childrens play areas. Almost every block had a kids play area and a shady area with some kind of historical item, such as a small shrine or stone lantern etc. Playgrounds were a sight we havent seen too much of in Japan thus far.
Finally made it to the peace park, which is a very pretty place, and it wasn't too crowded.
The peace park, apart from the museums, contains a huge fountain at one end, and then in a single line, an archway, and 100m or so further on is the eternal flame of peace, which will reportedly be extinguished when the last nuclear weapon on earth is destroyed. Unlikely.
Following the same line across the river is the Hiroshima "dome", which is the only building still standing after the bomb was dropped. It is a very effective photo opportunity to look through the dome, and through the flame, to see the dome in the background.
It was a photo I had to queue up for, and even then I had to get a bit forceful when clueless idiots would simply walk around and stand in front of the camera. Im lucky they didnt understand the phrase "punch in the back of the head" because I said it often enough. Eventually we got the shot and moved on.
We crossed over the "T" bridge beside the dome, which is, unsurprisingly, a large T shaped bridge which connects the peace park peninsula to the land on the other side of the 2 rivers which flank it.
This bridge was apparently the target for the Atomic Bomb dropped by the Enola Gay, as it was large enough to be easily identifiable from the air. How the A Bomb dome withstood the blast is a mystery, as it is about 50m from the bridge.
After the dome we continued onto the shopping centres on the other side of the river, which are basically entire city blocks simply blocked to vehicle access. The Hiroshimites really know how to shop. We trekked through them for what was literally hours, and then decided that since we'd walked that far that we could continue north to Hiroshima Castle. Another stupid idea. Basically we got there, and were underwhelmed and tired so we didn't bother paying the admission price to see it, and we turned around and trekked back. Caught the tram again back to the hotel. All up we probably walked about 8km or more. And that doesnt count the walking that we did while in Kyoto to get to the station.
Back in the WFC we went next door for okinomiyaki, which is basically a giant pile of barbequed stuff, all thrown together with bbq sauce, cooked by a short overworked japanese lady, who obviously spends her entire life behind the hotplate.
I think she had her whole family slaving away in there, and the shop felt like we were intruding in her house, but we were made very welcome, we walked in and her son got us glasses of water. Very nice food, and ultra cheap (massive servings for 550 yen, or $5.50 each) but once is enough. Couldnt eat it every day like the Osakans do. Might go to the tempura restaurant down the road tomorrow for dinner.
Heading to Miyajima in the morning, and from all weather accounts it will be pouring rain. If it is too bad we will come back and do the island again in one of the free days at the end of the trip, as it is something I really want to take my time and enjoy.
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