Blogs from Hiroshima, Hiroshima, Japan, Asia - page 9

Kobe is a smaller city compared to Osaka, built on a narrow strip of land between the mountains and sea. My time there was relaxing - I planned my time there to take it slow and see the few sights of interest. The hostel was in a bit of a strange neighborhood. There was a mix of residences, big commercial/industrial buildings and sake breweries. My hostel was on the second floor above an auto garage and right next door to what appeared to be a distribution warehouse for some kind of delivery company. The place itself was nice though. Very quiet, only a couple of other people were there. Kobe has a nice port area with some green space around a maritime museum and the Kobe tower. So I walked around there for a while. There ... read more

Vanuit Beppu zijn we vertrokken met de trein naar Hiroshima, één overstap en we zaten in de echte stop-shikansen, binnen een uur waren we op het station. Daar aangekomen heeft Patrick ons meegenomen met tram naar Dobasi, en van hieruit moesten we nog 3 blokken lopen eer we bij de ryokan (traditioneel hotel) aan kwamen. Dit bleek een business ryokan te zijn, erg klein en kaal. we hadden een eigen toilet, wastafel en tv. Een opvouw matras en een laag tafeltje. Voordeel hiervan we was dat alle bezienswaardigheden op loopafstand waren. Na het stallen van de koffers gingen we een rondje door het park lopen. door het park heen kwamen we in het zoveelste winkelcentrum met diverse eetgelegenheden - deze zitten op, onder en achterin winkels verstopt, alleen aangegeven door een half laag hangend gordijntje en ... read more

Having successfully negotiated our way from the station to the hostel we were able to dump our bags in our private ensuite room and begin sightseeing straight away. Almost immediately after leaving the hostel the rain began to fall in biblical proportions. We were able to grab an umbrella and commence without too much difficulty. We boarded the tram to the Atomic Bomb Dome. This is a building which was very close to the epicentre yet remarkably its shell and metal dome like structure withstood the bomb. It was decided that the building should remain as a monument to those who lost their lives. As we crossed the peace park we arrived at the “Children’s Peace Monument” Sadako Sasaki was exposed to the A- bomb when she was 2 years old but survived however when she ... read more

The first thought invoked by the word Hiroshima for nearly anyone is that it was the first city to suffer the devastation of an atomic bomb. On August 6th, 1945 a plane, the Enola Gay, approached the city. Many citizens thought that it was just a surveillance plane. Two more planes were behind and they would be used for measuring the bombs effect. The military saw them on radar but figured the contingent couldn't do much damage and thought nothing more of it. Up until this point Hiroshima had been spared any significant bombings but the truth was that the Allies decided to leave the city intact so it could study the effect of their new bomb. Also the two main things that sealed Hiroshima's fate was that there was no POW camp suspected of being ... read more

I am sitting on a park bench looking at what is now known as the A-bomb Dome. Up until August 6, 1945, it was the Industrial Promotion Hall of Hiroshima. All of that changed when it became one of the few structures left standing in the epicenter of the first atomic bomb dropped on a city. Everyone inside the building disintegrated when the A-bomb exploded almost directly above it. The structure remains standing as a memorial to that event. The building itself has a five-story concrete cylinder center with brick and concrete wings squaring off around it. A metal dome, like a skeleton of half the earth with just the lines of lattitude and longitude remaining, stands on top, and a twisted spiral staircase creeps up the side. There were many windows, but they are now ... read more