It took five hours to get to Hiroshima, and commuting arrangements didn’t really work in our favour in the end. The rain belt extended most of the way down the country and – thanks to this fact – the baseball match scheduled that day had been rained out. When we emerged from JR Hiroshima, we were confronted by scores of fans in their Carp shirts and caps queued up for the trams that service the main city area. It was raining. There was precious little shelter. We were all lugging at least two bags (suitcase/backpack and a day bag). And somehow we needed to get ourselves and said luggage up the crowded tram stairs while locals shoved past us (I don’t think we’re in Tokyo any more…).
Our stop was about 20 minutes down the line, and by that stage the crush had eased. We tumbled out of the tram and headed about five minutes further into semi-suburbia (still apartment-living only, mind you) and reached our hotel.
After the amazing put-together-ness of Japanese people Mum had marvelled at so far, she was surprised at the Chesty-Bonds-singlet-and-stubbies look of our accommodation’s proprietor. I must admit I didn’t notice, and hence have no picture of him, but I did manage to snap a shot of an Engrish fail:
The remainder of the day was our own, we were advised by our guide, but we would be meeting for dinner at お好み村 (Okonomi-Mura) in the evening. Right then. Exploration time. Mum and I headed out with a couple of the other girls to wander. We started at Peace Park, wandering through to the A-Bomb Dome via paper crane tributes from school-children around the world, including a few Australian schools (in Melbourne, Ballarat and Perth, if I remember correctly).
Then we ducked down into a subway tunnel and discovered a host of underground shopping. It was mostly fashion, but there was also an imported goods store (all it takes is a week away from home for Tim Tams and Milo bars to be ooh-ed and aah-ed over), and a book store within which I found a Japanese book I thought I’d have no chance of finding on my own. The shop assistant wrapped the cover in paper rather than giving me a bag – eco-friendly and allowed me to read in public without having to acknowledge what I was reading to anyone passing by. すごい、ね。
We eventually popped up to the surface outside Hon-dori, a popular shopping precinct. The first thing I saw when I looked around made me smile:
This is probably the closest I’ll get to Arashi all trip, but that’s totally fine with me. I’m not some crazy teenage fangirl 
Hon-dori is a mini-mecca for shopping, and I picked up some good stuff (boots! sneakers! clothes!) on the cheap here. Didn’t go all-out, though, as we had to be mindful of lugging stuff around. There wasn’t really an opportunity to post things home at that stage. We ended up outside Parco (department store) and stumbled on teen hang-out land. Having said that, it’s nothing like teens at home outside shopping centres and train stations – they weren’t overly noisy, everyone was disconcertingly well dressed, there was no drinking/smoking/spitting on the pavement/gum chewing. It was like an odd parallel universe.
Okonomi-mura was just across the street from this, but apparently our reservation had been shunted due to the popularity of okonomiyaki on a Saturday night, so we were told to reconvene in half an hour. We took the time to wander over to Hon-dori Hills, which clearly modelled itself on Tokyo’s Roppongi Hills – fashionable but overpriced, imported, semi-designer brands. The clothes and accessories were very nice, but there was no way I was paying approximately $AUD200 for a short-sleeved shirt. Sorry.
We headed back to the restaurant building again, and waited probably an extra 30 minutes inside for a seat. To explain, Okonomi-Mura (Okonomiyai Town) is not one but a series of okonomiyaki stalls, all crammed inside one multi-storey building. All serve their okonomiyaki Hiroshima-style (as opposed to Osaka style), but there are variations in their ingredients and cooking process. The stall we ended up at was run by two middle aged ladies, one of whom spent copious amounts of time at the back of the shop, smoking. OH&S? Not in this country! (Kind of nice, actually, compared to the slow shift towards a nanny state back home.) I think I’ll do an okonomiyaki post separately, as there were a LOT of photos and it will clog up proceedings here. Suffice to say they were freaking huge, and Mum was pretty much the only person in the tour group to finish (though I believe she regretted doing so later on).
After dinner, the others went to an entertainment complex (a multi storey building housing a games arcade, bowling alley, karaoke rooms, and various other distractions), but Mum and I – as would become the pattern – bailed in favour of laundry and an early night. It was a good thing, too – they got back very late, and some were very hungover the following morning!
The laundromat down the street was pretty much like laundromats I’ve visited in other countries, with the exception of the piles of monthly manga magazines (mostly Shounen Jump and such – not much on offer for the girls) in the corner.
The next day was supposed to be a free day, but due to the previous day’s rain, a ceremony over on Miyajima (Island – though really, ‘Island’ in this case is as superfluous as the ‘machine’ in ‘ATM machine’ or ‘number’ in ‘PIN number’) had been postponed and would take place tonight. So really it was just a free morning. This dashed my plans to catch the new Oguri Shun movie – there was no way I’d finish and get back in time. We all spilt off in various directions – some to the laundromat (haha, suckers!), others to museums and shrines, Mum to go sketching and me to shop.
We gathered back at the hotel at a bit after 1 p.m., and headed for Miyajima around 2 (tram, then train, then ferry). The first local we met when we arrived at the ferry terminal:
They might look cute, but they had a tendency to chew on anything that stayed still long enough, especially paper goods. One of our tour group had a few bites taken out of his map, and apparently a member of a previous group lost his JR Pass (ouch – those things are expensive), though heaven knows where it had been left for the deer to get to it like that!
I would have liked longer in Miyajima. I hadn’t known is was a group activity, and had initially planned to spend a whole day there. The afternoon we were given wasn’t nearly enough, and it’s definitely on my itinerary for Japan Revisited next year (hopefully!). The main street is very tourist geared, selling fans and chopsticks, geta, t-shirts, kimonos and so forth. There were also momiji manju – tasty little maple-leaf-shaped cakes with various fillings. Mum and I resisted the lure of the box sets (even if we managed not to scoff them, they’d be off by the time we got them back to Sydney), and just bought one each at 80円 a pop. Mine was cream cheese, and I think Mum had custard. In line with the Japanese cultural norm of not walking while eating, they were put in our bags for later.
Our guide took us down to the floating shrine and attempted to shepherd us all in at 300円 a pop. Mum and I took one look at the price, what was on offer and the weekend crowds and went “lolnothanks!!!”. We grabbed some shaved ice (rose flavour was delicious) on the main street, then we headed back to explore the backstreets of the island, which housed shops, galleries and cafes that apparently weren’t frequented by non-Japanese tourists that often (not surprising – most Western tourists seem to stick to the main drags, we’re English and sometimes French or Spanish signage generally accompanies the Japanese).
We found temples and shrines, too, though these seemed to be back on the well-beaten track. Dudn’t make it up the mountain, sadly. Apparently the view was sublime. We really needed more time. Somehow, just before dusk, we managed to stumble in to the floating shrine from the exit end (following a smattering of other tourists). No one was manning the gates and the crowds were gone. The shrine was pretty enough, but I’m glad I didn’t pay for entry, as there really wasn’t much of anything to see (other than the torii gate, which was visible from a lot of ‘free’ areas as well, and a lot of swampy stuff).
We met up with the group at dusk, grabbed some pics of the torii gate at sunset and then headed to a temple up the side of the mountain. Volunteers were helping set up for the evening’s ceremony, and we had to watch where we stepped, as there were tea lights everywhere. The looked great as the sun went down.
There was also a local monk performing some traditional songs up there. He was really good, though I was constantly distracted by the mozzies, who were evidently as hungry as the deer.
After a brief search in ‘town’ for restaurants, we gave up and headed to an izakaya back in outer Hiroshima, near the ferry terminal.
Then it was home to bed.
The next day became our replacement free day. Mum went sketching again, me window shopping. We met up in the afternoon at a cafe that Mum had discovered the day before (cake set! yay!). Then it was back to retail therapy, including the 100円 shop and more clothing and material. Oh, and knitted silk. I’ll let Mum recount that story; I can’t do it justice.
We had a quiet evening, and went to meet a Hiroshima survivor the following morning. He was 80 years old, and quite well versed in conversational English. His memory of the events were still quite clear, and he said he didn’t suffer PTSD like a lot of his compatriots did. It got a little graphic at times (people walking around with skin hanging off and visible muscles, like some sort of living anatomy models), but overall it was simply engaging and very, very sad.
Afterwards, we took a quick look at a photo exhibition on the rebuilding of Hiroshima, and then were hustled off to get our bags and catch the tram back to JR Hiroshima. Next stop: Kyoto via Himeji-jo.