The morning was spent on the beautiful island of Miyajima. Lyn & I managed to get away from the kids long enough to ask a passing Japanese tourist to take a shot of us almost at the foot of the floating torii on a low tide...
The afternoon was spent at Hiroshima's Peace Park and Peace Museum. 140,000 deaths is an almost meaningless statistic - until you read the names and stories of the individuals who were affected. This is a watch which stopped at the time of the world's first atomic explosion designed to kill civilians on the morning of August 6th, 1945.
The sandals of the now-famous Sadako, who died of leukemia while trying to complete her 1,000 paper cranes.
We were all pretty depressed after spending the afternoon at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, so it was nice when an 80+ local gentleman ("Tachibana-san") introduced himself and welcomed us to Hiroshima. He had escaped the A- bomb as he'd been conscripted to mainland China in 1945.
2 comments:
The visit to Hiroshima was very moving for Ryan. It was one of the most memorable parts of his trip to Japan.
Thanks, Peta. This was the third time I'd been to Peace Park & it still affects me every time. The two things that impress me most about Hiroshima:
• everything you see in the city (except the A-bomb Dome) has been built since 1945
• Despite the fact that they were totally annihilated by the bomb, they are are champions of world peace and don't seem to be bitter or hold grudges - in fact they welcome visitors with open arms...
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