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The only other major site in the Hiroshima area is an island just off the coast called Miyajima island. Like most other tourist sites it was way to busy on the main trails so we found a few smaller temples and shrines that were a little less visited. The one main temple we did visit was called Itsukushima Shrine, It was build just above the high tide line on wooden stilts in a small bay just off the ocean. Just off shore from it was a very big Otorii (wooden gate) which is apparently one of the most picturesque places in southern Japan. When we arrived there was a tea ceremony going on for women with over 100 of them in Kimonos so the island was very beautiful. They must really love their domesticated dear in this country because this island was also covered in those little beggars, probably worse than Nara was but at least they don’t encourage people to feed them here. The local snack on the island is a sort of cake with chocolate or cream filling in the shape of a leaf, they were pretty tasty. One funny thing that has been happening to us lately is when school children see us they start to say all of the words that they have learned in English, it doesn’t always make sense in the order they do it but thats why it’s funny. Lately it’s just been “herro” three or four times in a row and mostly boys but a few schoolgirls.
After Miyajima we headed back into Hiroshima and just walked around for a bit, now were just sitting around the room for a while resting our legs before we go find dinner. Tomorrow we are headed off to Fukuoka via the local trains again for Halloween, it’s a little bigger than Hiroshima so were hoping to find something fun happening for the holiday. Maybe we’ll go to a 100 Yen store and pick up some masks or something, or we’ll just go as scary white people. We’ll be there for nearly a week so I’m going to try and catch up on all of the emails I’ve been forgetting to write. I also heard back from the tour operator in Lhasa today, were heading to Tibet! I’m stoked for that leg of the trip.
Mike
Well today we went for an explore around Hiroshima, the first city to be bombed by a nuclear weapon. We started our day off by walking over the the Hiroshima Museum for Peace, which was really interesting, really big and really informative. It only cost 50 cents to get in and it was well worth it. I was even able to take some pictures inside. Some really shocking images inside, and they also had a lot of personal items from people who died in the bombing including things like keltoids (hardened skin chunks) and clothing they were wearing when the blast went off.
After we left the museum, we wandered through the Peace Park and looked at the different monuments and statues, as well as strings of paper cranes that were left in piles in different areas. We crossed the river and headed towards the A-Bomb Dome to take some pictures when we were approached by an English speaking free guide who led us around the area and showed us some interesting little things that we wouldn’t have known about otherwise. Apparently they have around 200 free guides for foreigners, most of which are survivors of the bomb. Our guide was four months old in his mother’s womb when it went off, but they were out in the country at the time – about three days later, his mother came into Hiroshima because her old house was near the explosion site and she wanted to see what happened to it, but she was exposed to the left over radiation. So our guide showed us his survivor status health card and told us what happened to the rest of his family as well. It was really interesting and we were pretty lucky to have encountered him! When he asked us where we were from and we said Canada, he was happy because he said that Canadians were such nice people and always polite. Luckily, I had one of the Kelowna pins on me, so I gave it to him (thanks family!).
It was nearly noon by the time we parted ways with the guide, and our tummies were grumbling after not having anything for breakfast, so we went to a department store and took the elevator up to the restaurant floor. We had a little pizza and a dish of shrimp and mushroom pasta in cream sauce. It was pretty good! We even got tea after the meal, which was really nice.
After lunch, we trekked up to Hiroshima castle, which is a ferro concrete reconstruction because it of course got destroyed by the bomb. The trees are starting to really change colors now so it’s nice to see, but the grounds weren’t really that great. The inside of the castle was converted into a museum, and they had a bunch of armor and hand forged blades on display. Pretty neat stuff.
We also made our way over to a garden a bit further east which had a bunch of paths, ponds, and fish in it. We walked around in there for a little while, and stumbled on some girls in kimonos having a photoshoot. I really wanted to jump in, but instead I took a couple sneaky pictures from far away. Can’t be butting in on another photographer’s territory! (Even though Mike thought I should and just chalk it up to being a foreigner.)
We were getting pretty tired, Mike didn’t get a very good sleep last night because he got that pain in his side again, so we made our way back to the hostel and walked down the shopping street along the way. I got a new paintbrush and some pots of color (black, red and gold) and we both got some iron-on patches. The bag I bought in Thailand a few years ago is starting to get holes in it so I figured I should patch it up with some Canadian flags! Pretty good idea eh?
Anyways, I should be putting up some new pictures on facebook soon. It’s only 4:30 here now, so who knows what else we’ll do tonight! (Probably not much after a full day of walking around…) Tomorrow we’re headed out to another world heritage sight called Miyajima Island and we’re looking forward to it!
Carolyn
Whenever your in Japan you better start bringing a garbage bag with you wherever you go, this country hasn’t invented them yet. Or at least doesn’t use them, each city we go to we see maybe two or three public ones the whole time.
Today started off with out any real plan, it had rained the day before and the forecast wasn’t looking good today either. When we looked outside it was overcast but had stopped raining for the moment, so we jumped back on the bikes and headed out to explore some of the sights around the this hostel because it’s our last day in this end of town. We checked out a couple of shrines on the way up the mountain and took a lot of really cool pictures. Carolyn was pretty tired by the time we got to the last shrine on the way up, which is weird because she works out so much in her spare time. The weather was holding up pretty good so we decided to head over to the “golden pavilion” which is a really neat garden and a small house that is covered in gold leaf. On the way it started to rain again, but just enough to be annoying and not need an umbrella but enough to get you a little wet.
When we got back to the hostel we decide to check out the 99 Yen store and find some little things to send home before we sent our packages off. I picked up some cool cups and chopsticks and Carolyn got some cups and soap, just random souvenirs. When we went to the local post office it was closed for the weekend so we headed down to the central post office which is inside Kyoto station. I’m not sure how but we ended up getting the post nazi for all of Japan, stop me if anyone has ever actually done this but he wanted to open our packages and weigh each item separately?! Then he added up all of the dollar amounts to see if the total for the insurance was correct and made Carolyn re write her packing list. We kept trying to tell him that we had sent several packages home before without a problem. He told us Canada has very strict customs! I’m not sure how a bunch of guys in toques drinking beer could be strict but hey, maybe.
One funny thing I was going to mention, we started tagging words in our blogs and watching how many people view the site. when we added “naked woman” it jumped! funny stuff. So sorry for fooling everyone but we forgot to upload boobs or butts today but you never know what pictures we will take if we drink to much sake.
Mike
Crazy Japanese TV! But it’s funny to watch because of the sound effects.
But back to the beginning…after settling into the hostel that we’re staying at we decided to head over to a flea market that apparently only happens once a month here in Kyoto. We rented bikes from our hosts and cycled over to the grounds (which were actually temple grounds, so that was kind of neat). A funny thing about riding bicycles in Japan is that you’re allowed to ride them anywhere – on the road or the sidewalk, and there are so many bikes on the sidewalk you can chime your bell and people automatically move to one side. In addition, they park their bikes everywhere, just leave them all over the streets, kind of funny. But moving on, we park our bikes on the street and walk up and down the outdoor aisles of the flea market. I ended up buying two kimonos, both black with patterns on them. A funny thing too, while I was looking at Kimonos, one of the shop keepers asked Mike if he was Brad Pitt. Nice mistake, eh!
After we had our fill of the flea market (and a chocolate dipped banana rolled in sprinkles) we hopped back on our bikes and headed to the sword shop for Mike to get his sword. We stopped across the street at a Japan handicraft store first and we each got a woodblock print. I got mine for my parents and Mike got his because it matches his room really well. Then we went across the street to the sword store. Mike was as happy as a kid in a candy store! I bought a tsuba (which is a sword guard) with bamboo designs and Mike got an Iaito sword custom designed for him. It has a water theme, with waves and fish, with a black case and a blue wrapped handle. They’re going to ship it right to Canada for him, and they’re sending it to my parents house (got that Mom and Dad?). He also got Iaito pants, called Hakama, a sword stand, a sword bag and they gave him three cleaning cloths for free. It was pretty funny too, when they were tallying the price up they would look at the price of the item (like the sword bag 3700yen) and he would write it down as 3500yen. He knocked a few dollars off all the smaller items, gave him $10 off the sword, and $20 off the pants. Pretty good day for him!
Now that we were loaded down with purchases, we decided to bike back to the hostel, which luckily was downhill most of the way and only took us about a half an hour.
When we got back and dropped off our stuff, we went out for a walk and got some lunch from this really delicious bakery near us. They had sandwiches for about $2 and they were really good! We’re looking forward to eating there again, and buying sandwiches to take with us on our day trips. We love cheap good food!
Walking around, you get used to it, but they have these vans that drive around with megaphones that yell out who knows what. They’re really loud too. On our way back from lunch, we walked past a guy who must have some sort of mental problem, peeing into a grate with his penis out of his pants. He seemed quite interested in it too, we were pretty surprised! It’s the first offensive thing we’ve seen in Japan, but still, we laughed.
It’s pretty funny here too, being Japan you would think there would be a lot of sushi, but we haven’t really had much since Tokyo! There was a place in Osaka that we had a couple of pieces, but they mostly have the nigiri sushi here, and not much of the roll variety. Which is too bad, because the rolls in Canada are amazing, and here…well, not quite what we were expecting!
I’m sure we’ll have more to write about tomorrow, keep reading!
New pics…
October 26, 2007 in Casual Photos, Random, Travel, Uncategorized | Tags: albums, comments, facebook, lazy, pictures | Leave a comment
Two new picture albums up on facebook, check them out! We’re feeling a little lazy today, so we’ll likely write more tomorrow. Leave comments on facebook if you want more details about any of the pictures.
Cheers!