Hiroshima

I think that most people in the world today would know about Hiroshima……there has even been a movie about it recently (far too long in my opinion, the movie that is). 

And that is where we are. We left lovely Takayama on the Haida Express then three changes of Shinkansen to Hiroshima. The room at the Sheraton Grand, right on the station, is grand indeed. Japan is renowned for small hotel rooms but we have had all very new, spacious and well appointed ones (except Horokoku) all the way.

This is for Wendy A. The view from our window.
Hiroshima is now a modern, vibrant city.

Not too shabby!

Dinner was early after a long travelling day and we went searching for a local delicacy, “Okinomiyaki”…. Which wasn’t hard to find ….. and was delicious.

It’s a sort of fried pancake with noodles veggies and meat inside.
Wendy’s chopstick skills are better than mine

But it was the dome and the Peace Park that we had come out of our way to see. Originally we were going to return a silk Japanese flag that my grandfather “liberated” during the war on the Kokoda track, but it turned out to be more complicated than we had imagined…something like….”here you go…this belongs to you, we thought you might like it back.” But no. After contacting the Embassy in Australia and finding that it takes six months…and there are multiple pages of documents to complete, we decided that this probably was not the time.

It was a sobering experience and, even though we both know about Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the museum was confronting. There are signs on the entry wall for parents of small children to watch for indicators of distress whilst experiencing the exhibits. The warning was justified.

We sort of hurried though the last part…it was evidence of pain and misery over and over and we both came to the conclusion that it would probably be much more beneficial for some of our world leaders to visit this place.

August 6th 1945

And the memorial today….through my lense.

The way Hiroshima has risen, phoenix like, from the ashes of that incredible blast in just 80 years is quite amazing.

Lots of visitors and school groups visit the museum and memorial.

And a deep bell or gong rings regularly….sets a tone for the visit.

An experience on the way out of the park however just reinforced for us the notion that essentially…we are all the same…generations of people just trying to do their best in the world, with the same needs, wants and fears. And also simple things …like school lunches…yes lunches…..how do they organise such a basic thing?

There were groups of school kids visiting the museum (they are all dressed to the nine’s in their very snappy but a bit militaristic school uniforms- think Kings School) and they were having lunch in the park…as school groups do on excursions. But we were fascinated that they all had individual “bento boxes”, and very nice they looked too. So we stopped and asked them (through that marvellous translator app again) if the school provided the lunches like in France or did they buy them from the shop? No….turns out that some things are universal…… their mothers’ made them ….and they sure beat a Vegemite sandwich!

Wendy happened to have some little gifts from Australia ( boomerang fridge magnet and kangaroo pins) which she gave to them…and they were chuffed. As we were wandering off we wondered how the conversation over dinner for those families would go that night🙂

Speaking of sandwiches, we were going to try “bento” boxes when travelling on the Shinkansen legs of our trip but the contents, understandably, are quite Japanese. However, we found a great alternative in the ubiquitous 7/11 stores …..they do great packaged sandwiches! Actually the amount of packaged food here in Japan is mind blowing.