Monday 12th February 2007

On the weekend, all the Aussie teachers went to Hiroshima. It was the most amazing experience ever! I loved every second of Hiroshima. It was a very clean town, with lots of trees and plants and flowers and parks. It was also a very sad, solemn town and when we went to the Peace Park, it was extremely, eerily and unusually quiet. As soon as we stepped foot into that park, the mood was totally changed and everyone who was in the park at the time was quiet and had their heads down the whole time.

There is a monument in the park which displays the exact spot where the atomic bomb was dropped in Hiroshima at 8:15am on 6th August 1945. It was also amazing to see the beautiful paper crane display in glass cases which were designed by thousands of schools all throughout the world. Their artwork gets displayed in the Hiroshima Peace Park in memory of all the people who died from radiation poisoning from the blast. Then in the middle of all the artwork, lies a tall monument with a girl standing at the very top with her arms outstretched above her head, and she is holding a crane. It is a symbol of peace and hope that one day there will be a more peaceful future for the world.

It is all inspired from Sadako. Many people would have read the book Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes. Sadako was dying of radiation poisoning as she developed leukaemia and she thought that if she could fold one thousand paper cranes, that she would be granted one wish. Her wish was to live. She never made it to one thousand, so she died at the age of twelve. It was a very sad story. I bought the book from the Peace Museum, so I will show people when I get back if they haven’t read the story.

The Peace Museum was amazing. It was so sad to hear all the individual stories about how people coped with the blast and what happened to some of the people. There were pictures of what Hiroshima was like before the blast and what it was like afterwards, and it just looked like it was totally ripped to shreds. There was nothing left of the city after the bomb. Now the city has recovered from the blast and the only building left standing is the A-bomb Dome. The building was used for many different cultural activities and it used to be very busy and in demand. Now all that is left is a ruin – a reminder of something Hiroshima used to have before the blast. It is a beautiful building. They have kept it looking exactly like it did after the blast. It was interesting to look around the building and read all the plaques about what the building was used for and how it is now Heritage listed.

After having been to the museum and the Peace Park, we decided to go to Miyajima. This is an island that takes about thirty minutes to get there by ferry. It is a beautiful island that has lots of deers and monkeys. The deers got a bit annoying after a while because they love eating paper and I was standing on the footpath looking at my map trying to figure out where I was and this deer came up to me and bit a hole out of my map! Then it kept coming back for more! They are not afraid of humans, that’s for sure!

We saw the Tori Gate. It was the most beautiful construction I have ever seen. It is situated in the water, close to the shore and I took so many nice photos of it. I got very snappy happy on this trip! We also went up this mountain in a cable car and saw some monkeys and deers. The monkeys and deers were friends and the monkeys would sit down next to the deers and pick the fleas out of the deers’ coats! It was so funny to watch! Then Tina and I hiked up this mountain called Mt Missen. We had to hurry because everyone wanted to get back to the Tori Gate before sunset and take some nice photos. So we sprinted up this mountain, took a couple of photos when we reached the top, then we sprinted back down the mountain. It was a rushed trip, but it was worth it. We were absolutely stuffed by the end of it though!

Thankfully, we made it back in time to see the Tori Gate at sunset. We got some great photos of it, so everyone was happy.

Miyajima is famous for its oysters. They are very fresh and cooked well. So for lunch, we ate some nice barbequed oysters. They were the BEST oysters I have EVER tasted in my life. They were so fresh – like they had just come out of the sea five minutes before I ate them! I was so glad I got to try them!

So our weekend in Hiroshima was one to remember forever. I will definitely have to go back there – especially to Miyajima because I want to see the beautiful mountains again. There are many hikes that you can go on and I would love to spend a day or two hiking around the island. Hiroshima is a must see in Japan. It will take your breath away – just as it did mine!