Hiroshima and Miyajima

In Japan we don't get Christmas Holidays. But we do get a variety of other public holidays including "Respect For the Aged Day," "Nature Day," "Young Adults Day" and (this weekend's holiday) "School Sports Day." So I don't think we're missing out. (Me especially, since our school is "international" we do get Christmas off, and Easter, and Thanksgiving!)

In honour of School Sports Day, Mike and I took the Shinkansen down to Hiroshima for the weekend. Hiroshima is 894.2 kilometres from Tokyo by Shinkansen. The Nozomi (Super Express!) does the trip in 4 hours 5 minutes - including "brief stops" in a few "important places" along the way. As a comparison, the distance between Wellington and Auckland (by train) is 680.7 kms and it takes the Overlander just about 12 hours to make the trip. Speedy.

So. Hiroshima. In case you didn't know it was the target of the world's first atomic bombing in 1945, killing an estimated 80,000 people directly and 60,000 people in the following months. Everything combustible within about 2kms of the bomb's epicentre was incinerated. You get to read all about this (and see the graphics) at the Peace Memorial Museum, which is at the Peace Park. We spent the afternoon there on Saturday and did the Audio Tour. It was very sad - depressing even - although it was also very interesting.

The Museum takes a very anti-nuclear (weapons) view on the whole thing (understandably) and also on the future/way forward for World Peace. This didn't surprise me in the slightest, nor did I find it unreasonable. But I guess that's coming from New Zealand's own anti-nuclear stance. It was interesting discussing the Museum with an American colleague this morning as they were looking at it from a completely different perspective. (In terms of nuclear weapons, not talking about whether the bomb should have been dropped and all that which is a whole other conversation)

We also took in the A-Bomb Dome, the city's only remaining bomb damaged building. Quite a strange sight in a modern, Asian city to see a stone, Czech designed building with no roof.

I found Hiroshima itself very beautiful. There were plenty of trees, wide (tree-lined) streets, rivers, bridges and of course we had amazing weather for the entire weekend which probably helped! Despite the Museum and things like public transport being packed for the Holiday weekend, it never seemed busy or overcrowded and it was just a really nice place for a break.

We also got lucky with our accommodation. Sarah strikes again with the organisation woes - it was looking like we might not get a bed in Hiroshima as nowhere seemed to have a twin/double room available for Saturday night (Sunday was fine). I also found out later that we were lucky to Shinkansen tickets as well - one of Mike's workmates assumed we were flying down as we were arranging it all so late in the piece. Well, it all worked out in the end and we managed to get a room at Minshuku Ikedaya .. listed in the Lonely Planet no less!

The room was clean (hurrah!) and had everything we needed (futon - check, linen - check, private bathroom - check!) and a few things we didn't. Our hosts were friendly, it was QUIET and it was close to the Peace Memorial Park, a few okonomi-ya and the trams. Sweet. AND it was cheap (for Japan).

We spent Sunday on Miyajima, a small island accessible by ferry from Hiroshima. It's famous for it's shrine, Itsukushima which 'floats' at high tide. The island is apparently one of Japan's three most scenic views.

We (I) fed the deer, walked through the Shrine, ate oysters (and some other random things) and walked up Mt Misen. We actually took the world's most crowded cable car most of the way up and then did the 1km walk to the top. In the weather we had, that was definitely a good thing!

We were pretty exhausted on Sunday night but we still managed to go out for okonomiyaki! We found this great little place near our minshuku and the owner chatted away to us while he cooked our dinner. He even asked us if we spoke Spanish (in Spanish) .. sorry, no. But it was a fun dinner - and delicious!

On Monday we slept late which was a nice change after our early starts. We thought we'd have heaps of time, take out luggage to the station and maybe spend the day at Shukkein Garden and do some shopping. It took us over an hour to find somewhere for our suitcase. Every coin locker in Hiroshima Station was full! In the end we were directed to a luggage deposit room.

When we finally found it (harder than you'd think) we then had to explain what time we would be back ... time to put Sarah's Japanese lessons to use! Unfortunately Japanese numbers (particularly time) aren't my strong point. Small problem with there being a different counter for nearly every thing you can imagine in Japanese. Dunno why. But anyway, the poor guy eventually asked me to write the time on his hand with his red marker. And then he said exactly what I swear I had been saying all along!

By that stage we were starving so we jumped on a tram, back to all the shops and had a really delicious curry lunch set. It is amazing how good curry rice can be here .. and how popular it is! After lunch we barely had time for a quick walk around the gardens, but they were small and with Mike on the case we managed to squeeze as much in as possible. We even arrived back at the station with enough time to buy snacks for the train before it was time to say goodbye to Hiroshima.