This is my post that was essentially finished on the date of it's intended publication but managed to climb further into the recesses of my backlogged blog as the prospect of attempting to cover the widening gap from my last post became more and more daunting.
JULY 27TH- HIROSHIMA TO KYOTO
It’s a little after 9 PM here in the Orient and we are speeding towards our first real destination of our trip. We’re relaxing on the express rail to Kyoto with another satisfactory day under our belt. As we assumed might be the case, the weather did very little to help us out and we’ve accepted that the weather may be a reoccurring obstacle for us in the future. Accepting that unfortunate state of affairs, we managed a very moving, though sobering, day in one of only two cities in the world to ever experience the effects of a direct strike from an atomic bomb.
Our efforts to find lunch after we arrived were yet again trying. We’ve realized that although we aren’t really picky about where we eat, we kind of are. We saw a few restaurants that looked like they could be potential dining spots but I think we were just hesitant to commit to one thing knowing that there might something else out there. Should our relationship with Japan ever get serious I worry that this fear of commitment may get in the way somewhere down the road. Either way, with only one day in Hiroshima, lunch was a minor concern, and once we had eaten our fill we braved the rain as it was falling its hardest and marched toward the Hiroshima Museum. With the rain falling at a rate that made umbrellas virtually ineffective, we hurried through Hiroshima park, taking only sidelong glances and catching faint glimpses of what was around us, bent on making it indoors as soon as possible.
When we finally made it inside, we started into the heart of the museum when we discovered that we would be able to catch two movies about Hiroshima and The Bomb just as they were about to start. I think the three of us agree that this was the best move possible. They were two documentaries- one concentrating a little more on the sentimental humanistic side while the other took a broader look at the factual and real aspects of what occurred there in 1945. By the end of the two of them, though somewhat dispirited, we were far more suited to appreciate what we would be seeing within.
It was odd to realize that although we’ve read about and heard about Hiroshima and Nagasaki over and over again in our lives, there still remains a very real disconnect that doesn’t really dissolve until you actually go to the place that it happened and are among the descendants and survivors of who it happened to. Perhaps the most intriguing part of the experience was the different perspectives that were made available to me at a single time. It was peculiar notion to think that, after having read and heard about these events from an American voice, the voice of the bomber, I was immersed in the world of the bombed. Even as I heard the same story again I couldn’t help but look at it in a completely different way. It was not only that but also, in the company of two Canadians, it was interesting to see how even they learned about and heard about the same events somewhat differently. Overall, I was impressed by how well the design of the museum was executed and while certain parts of the movies were graphic, it could all be appreciated within the context of the subject at hand.
We left the museum the way the museum intends you to leave it and the way Hiroshima, as a city, intends you to leave it- somber but hopeful. Unlike when we had arrived at the museum, as we left the rain was falling but at a more reasonable rate. This time we were able to appreciate the park that lay beyond the museum in its entirety. Dappled with various trees and dotted with sculptures dedicated to the memory Hiroshima’s tragic destruction, the park culminates with two major focal points that can be seen in unison from the exit of the museum- the perpetually lit torch at the center of park, burning until all nuclear arms and processing plants are dismantled and destroyed and the A-Bomb dome in the backdrop, the last remaining ruins of a city that was once entirely flattened in a single morning. Still, the most telling monument in the entire is probably the people and the city itself. Were it not for history books and memories, a casual observer would never suspect what went on there.
Dinner in Hiroshima was a pretty casual affair. We went back to the train terminal to set up our ride to Kyoto and looked around in the immediate area for something that caught our eye. It took some time and about three laps around the restaurant area of the terminal before we found a place that wasn’t too crowded and satisfied our evidently particular tastes. We managed what proved to be a pleasant surprise as we sat down to a small bar with about eight stools that was comprised of enough space for eating and a huge skillet top where the food was prepared right in front of you. The fare was essentially a battery pancake on the bottom of a vast array of different vegetables all thrown together and held together by the aforementioned pancake. It was simple but substantial and in the way of regrets there were none.
Our departure of Hiroshima went like the entire day’s visit, quiet. While the excitement of heading to our next destination could be felt creeping upon us, we boarded our train with a subdued reverence for the city and people we were leaving.
