Sightseeing: Hiroshima

I rested in Nagoya for about a day after hiking and then took the shinkansen to Hiroshima.

In the past, I've ridden two other famous high-speed trains: France's TGV and Germany's ICE. The two best things that I remember about the TGV are that it was relatively inexpensive and extremely quiet. The worst thing that I remember about the TGV was that the legroom was rather limited.

The ICE also brings back good as well as bad memories. The good: The ICE is comfortable, roomy, and fast, and there is a handy display showing the train's speed. The bad: The ICE is expensive, often runs behind schedule or even breaks down, and travels over certain routes barely faster than the cheaper trains.

My shinkansen experience was a completely different story. The train was fast and on-time, and I had plenty of legroom, there were lots of seats, since the rows were in a 3-2 format, rather than the usual 2-2, and the aisle down the middle was wider than the aisle on most trains I've been on. The most impressive thing about the shinkansen, however, is that there seems to be a train every 10-15 minutes. Incredible!

Of course, Japan's high-speed train is a little pricey: I paid 14,030 yen for the roughly 420 km ride, although I easily could have saved a few hundred yen if I hadn't taken the nozomi superfast shinkansen plus another 1,100 yen or so by not reserving a seat (live and learn!). But you can't beat the comfort and the speed: 2:20! The nod clearly goes to the shinkansen!

I arrived in Hiroshima at about 1:30 p.m. on August 6, the day of the anniversary of the A-bomb.

Unfortunately, I missed out on the remembrance ceremony, since that was held early in the morning. But I did get to see the lantern festival at night. Hundreds of lanterns were decorated and then floated down the river, making for a lovely sight. And there was music, too, that added a nice touch to the celebration of peace.

The next day I spent a lot of time at and near the Peace Memorial Park. There were lots of memorials and monuments, as well as a museum.

One of the most impressive sights in the peace park area was the thousands and thousands of origami cranes that people had made and donated to the Children's Peace Monument. As a matter of fact, while I was looking around and taking pictures, several people showed up with their "vines" of folded cranes and added them to the exhibit, something that the public is encouraged to do.

Of course, I also saw the so-called A-Bomb Dome that is one of the symbols of Hiroshima. Like practically everyone else who was there, I took tons of pictures of the destroyed building. And I did a lot of thinking, trying to imagine what it must have been like to have been present when the bomb went off.

Sometimes, when I see something famous with my own eyes, I'm not overly impressed and I think to myself, "Well, at least now I can say I've seen it." But the A-Bomb Dome had a greater effect on me. The people who decided not to tear it down knew what they were doing.

Another really cool place in Hiroshima is Miyajima, an island off the southwest coast of the city that takes only 15 minutes to reach by ferry (but it took about 45 minutes to reach the ferry terminal by streetcar!).

The most famous site on the island is undoubtedly the Itsukushima shrine and its fantastic red torii, both of which are surrounded by water(!) at high tide. When I happened to visit, the tide was out. Perhaps the view wasn't quite as spectacular as it could have been, but I at least had an opportunity to get a really good look at the torii. I'll have to go back someday to see the place during high tide to see what is more impressive.

Just like in Nara, there are also wild deer roaming about. I saw them from the moment I stepped off of the ferry. One deer was especially brave and came right up to me and started sniffing at my shorts, clearly in search of food.

My first night in Hiroshima, I stayed in a capsule hotel. That was quite an experience. I knew the place would probably only be of the 1 or 2 star variety, but "Spend a night at a capsule hotel" was one of the things on my "To Do While Living In Japan" list.

So I showed up a little after 4 p.m., when check-in starts. I paid my 2300 yen (those are some pretty cheap accommodations) and the strange man behind the counter handed me a couple of keys, one for my shoe locker and the other for my clothes locker. Then he asked me if I wanted a yukata-like robe. I had seen a guy already wearing one, but I didn't see the point of that, so I declined. (I guess in some capsule hotels, you are supposed to wear the robe.) Once I was all set, I took a tour of the place. It was about what I expected: Not very clean, but not very dirty. I guess you could say it reminded me a little of my college days living in a dormitory.

Downstairs, that is on the first floor, there was a small communal area with vending machines and a television set. Just next to that, there was a locker room, which included some sinks, a bathroom, and a shower room/mini-onsen.

The capsules were upstairs. Mine was on the second floor. The capsules were pretty much just that: fairly small sleeping compartments, stacked two high. I tried mine out and found it to be roomier than I expected and actually relatively comfortable. There was even a tiny air-conditioning unit inside, so I wasn't worried about sweating to death at night, as well as a tiny light, a 12-inch television set (you had to put coins in a slot to use the TV), a small clock that probably had an alarm setting, and a little radio, all seemingly from the 1970's. And the area was so quiet that I barely noticed several guys resting or even sleeping in their capsules.

There were also luggage lockers, but I didn't bother schlepping my bags with me to the hotel. Instead, I left them at the train station.

The one thing that struck me the most about the capsules was that they didn't have a door, per se, but more of a sliding panel. Since I couldn't figure out how to lock mine and was actually worried that I might lock myself in, when I went to bed all I did was slide the thing shut. Even though the place was male-only, I wasn't worried in the least that some freak would try to open my compartment while I was sleeping. The place was a bit shady, but not that shady.

I guess there are some nicer capsule hotels around Japan, so maybe I'll try one out again someday. Heck, it was cheap and conveniently-located, and I slept much better than I expected.

One more thing I did while I was in Hiroshima was take a tour of the baseball stadium where the Hiroshima Carp play. The Carp weren't in town, but there happened to be a college tournament going on, so I was fortunate enough to have gotten a chance to go inside the stadium. I'm not sure if the place is going to be torn down after this season, but the Carp are moving into a new stadium next season, so I cherished the opportunity to get a close look at the old stadium.

Oddly enough, the new stadium is being built far from downtown, whereas the old stadium that the Carp currently play in is located smack-dab in the middle of town, right across the street from the A-Bomb Dome. It's hard to believe that the team thinks it's a good idea to move away from the city, when most teams, at least in the United States, do their best to build their new stadiums as close to downtown as possible.

And finally, what trip to Hiroshima would be complete without okonomiyake? Okonomiyake is kind of a cross between a deluxe pancake and a deluxe omelet. And the two places in Japan that are famous for the dish are Osaka and Hiroshima. I'm not exactly sure what the main difference between the two styles of okonomiyake is, but I think it's this: In Osaka, the ingredients are all mixed together before the okonomiyake is fried up and in Hiroshima, the okonomiyake is made one layer at a time. In any case, that's as much as I understood when I asked the young lady who served me to explain the difference. I may be sick of some Japanese food, but I still find okonomiyake to be rather delicious, especially since you can have just about anything you want on it. Besides (as I believe I mentioned in an earlier blog), okonomiyake was the first meal I had in Miyazaki, so it holds a special place in my heart.

I didn't experience all of what Hiroshima has to offer, but I had a great time there and I wanted to save something for another time.

Thanks, Hiroshima!