The next place we headed was Hiroshima. As soon as we got there, we headed to the Hiroshima Peace Museum. I have to say, I was not prepared for what I was about to see. It was a pretty heavy museum, and there were tons of personal effects of people who had been victims and personal stories from survivors. I didn't end up taking many pictures inside the museum because frankly I became overwhelmed, but a few that I did take which I felt were particularly powerful are below. These were aerial pictures of before and after the blast. Over 140,000 people died as a result of the initial blast.
After we left the museum, we were surrounded by monuments and reminders of the bomb. The top image is the Atomic Bomb Dome, a building that was in the initial blast. The city decided to leave it up as a reminder of the devastation that can be caused by atomic weapons and also a symbol for Hiroshima's quest for world peace. The second image is in memorial to a little girl named Sadako Sasaki. She was exposed in the blast when she was 2 years old and later when she was 12, diagnosed with Leukemia as a result of her exposure. She began making paper cranes, believing that if she made 1000 of them, her disease would be cured. Sadly she never was able to make the full 1000 before she died, but her school mates continued her mission and now the paper crane has become a symbol of Sadako and her fight. The other two pictures are additional monuments in the peace park.
Being American, I never really felt up to this point that I had a good understanding of what had happened in Hiroshima. In our school books it is referred to as the bomb that ended the war and besides that there is not much detail given. It never even occurred to me that Hiroshima would rebuild itself and try to make itself an international symbol for an ongoing quest for World Peace. At the end of the museum there were books and books of letters from famous leaders throughout the world who had visited the museum and their thoughts and reflections on it. The only American leader listed was Nancy Pelosi.
After reflecting on the massive historical significance of Hiroshima, we decided to try to do some of the fun things they had available there, too. We decided to go to a beer garden on the roof of one of the buildings. Apparently they have these beer gardens every night, they have them on tons of buildings in the city, they cost about $25 and its all you can eat (good) food and all you can drink beer from 5:30PM til 10. This set up would be massively popular in Australia or the U.S. and presumably that is why this set up doesn't exist in either. As Linds and I pounded enough beers to ensure we got our moneys worth, we noticed that most of the other patrons really were just having an affordable dinner with friends with a few drinks.
It also happened to be Egyptian themed the night we went which led to some strange music and the giant pyramid in the photo above.
We had wanted to go to a baseball game but unfortunately the weather didn't cooperate with us in the next few days. I particularly wanted to go because the team was called the 'Hiroshima Carp'. Apparently they really suck, but I was just stoked that they actually picked that fish (albeit a shitty fish) to be their mascot. However I managed to get a picture of one of their signs so really that's all I needed.
The one thing I regrettably did not get to see in Hiroshima that I really would have liked to were the love hotels. They are hotels that, as the name hints, can be rented by the hour, but apparently all of the rooms have different crazy themes or the overall hotel has a theme that all of the rooms are outfitted to look like. Though it would have been really fun to see, Lindsey and I couldn't justify paying for an hour in the hotel just for 2 minutes of picture taking and 58 minutes of awkward standing around.
Nonetheless, Hiroshima was very cool and I really enjoyed learning about the history of the A-bomb there. After Hiroshima, next one on the list was Miyajima!
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