Meet Us In Munich!

After our first night of confusion with the public transportation system, we had no problems finding our way back to Tokyo Station to catch the Shinkansen, the bullet train, to Hiroshima. Our train ride was at 11:15 in the morning. The train arrived at 11:12. We stepped inside, took our seats, and precisely at 11:15 we were southwestward bound towards our destination. We expected the trains to be fast, but we were blown away by their blazing speed. We traveled a distance of about 550 miles in about 4 hours! Christina took this video. You can see just how fast we were going. Pay attention to the clouds of the smoke stack. They look frozen as we moved around them!

When we arrived, we made our way to Hana Hostel, dropped off our bags, and went in search for some food. As usual, we were itching to try the local street cuisine, so we asked the hostel staff for a good place we could eat okonomiyaki, a Hiroshima specialty. They pointed us to a place just near the train station, located on the sixth floor of a department store. A department store? We were puzzled until we actually went to the place. After stepping out of the elevator, we saw that the entire floor was dedicated to tiny kiosk-style eateries.

The whole place was pretty empty since we were there before the work-crowd headed over for happy hour. It looked like all the stalls made okonomiyaki, so we ended up choosing a place with the prettiest pictures. The okonomiyaki was made with a pancake batter-like mixture, egg, noodles, cabbage, octopus, pork and some yummy sauce drizzled on top.

Chef making our Hiroshima style Okonomiyaki

The completed dish and ice-cold beer to compliment

After our early dinner, we took a stroll around the vicinity of the train station.

Half an hour later, we started feeling jet-lagged again, so we headed back towards the hostel to get some rest. We wanted to rest up for our marathon of sightseeing the following day. This was thwarted though by the stores selling kitschy items that deserved our immediate attention. We got sucked into window shopping for another couple hours.

That next day we woke up bright and early, and took a 30 minute local train to Miyajima-guchi station where we then boarded a ferry to Miyajima Island (all covered by our JapanRail Pass, sweet!). The ferry ride was only 10 minutes and you could see the excitement building in everyone’s faces as we were approaching the Island, myself included. Miyajima Island is considered one of the most picturesque places in Japan. The Shinto Shrine of Itsukushima was designated a national treasure in Japan. What makes it real interesting is that it is built out over the water. During high-tide, the shrine looks like it’s floating in the water.

Our first view of the Floating Torri and Itsukushima Shrine

When we got off the ferry, we were greeted by the docile deer of the island.

They turned out to be nice as long as you didn’t have anything edible within their reach. Other tourists who were not familiar with the idea of wild animals decided to feed them. They were suddenly rushed by the deer, and whatever they had in their possession soon disappeared into the animals’ mouths. This included paper maps, hats, bags containing snacks, hand fans, etc. We even saw a deer bite a lady on the posterior as she turned her back, trying to hide the food she had in her hand! So much for being docile…

We continued our walk around the island.

Red banners inside Senjokaku

One of many beautiful windows views

Interesting dragon statue

Another angle of the Floating Torri and Itsukushima Shrine

We made our way to Daisho-in Temple where we saw plenty of photographic possibilities. This was the first time we heard some monks chanting and it only to added to the spiritual energy of the place.

Daisho-in Main Gate

Stairway to upper temple complex

A garden lined with many statues of monks

Temple pagoda

Statue of Kannon

Prayer wheels

Monk chanting a prayer for a couple

Prayer statues for offerings

There happened to be an exhibition showing Samurai armor that was used in all those Kurosawa films, so we decided to take a quick look.

As we left Daisho-in Temple, we saw a Torri that was the start of the trail to another temple complex.

It looked so inviting but unfortunately we didn’t have enough time to go and so we headed back down the hill towards the main part of town. We saved our visit to Itsukushima Shrine for last. When we arrived we were surprised to see how much the water had receded. The tide had gone down which allowed all the tourists to make there way to the once Floating Torri.

Barrels filled with Sake, a shrine offering I think

Crazy incline of a wooden bridge

After our visit to Itsukushima Shrine, we made our way back to the ferry for a ride back to the mainland. We couldn’t leave though without sampling the oysters, something this region was known for.

The trip back to Hiroshima was a good chance to rest in the air-conditioned train cars. When we arrived in the city, we took a tram to the area that made this city so well known, the epicenter of the atomic bomb, now known as the Hiroshima Peace Park and Museum. It was a testament to the fact that we are all capable of doing and producing really evil things. It was very depressing to see the photographs and read the stories of what people suffered through because of that horrific day.

The A-Bomb Dome, one of the only structures left standing from the bomb.

A scaled model of the city before the bomb

After

Memorial for the A-Bomb Victims

The Peace Bell

Instead of being a place of seething resentment for its victims, it has become a center where people profess to the idea for peace throughout the world so that this could never happen again to anyone. We hope that all our voices for peace will not remain unheard for too long .

Countless paper-cranes for peace

Jay