Sayonara, Japan. Hello, disaster.

NOTE: This final post of our Japanese trip is written partially from the plane and partially days after getting home because I needed several of those to get over what can only be described as "absolute fuckery".

Our final transit day has arrived, and it is time to say goodbye to Japan.

Packing was relatively easy as we had gotten through most of it the night before. It was really just getting dressed, packing toiletries and looking for loose toys that might have been missed.

I wanted to get a taxi to Hiroshima station so downloaded the Go app to sort that out. Annoyingly there is nowhere to specify how many people are travelling or what size car you need. The closest it came was a bit to tick that you wanted a car with sliding doors because they are good for multiple people and luggage. That’s it. Unconvinced, I ordered two cars just to be safe. Neither of the two cars that showed up would have fit all of us in one so it proved the right call. We split up and momentarily for the 10-minute drive and reunited at the station.

We found our bullet train gate with relative ease and then grabbed something to eat from a bakery close by. Teneille’s day endured early disappointment when she found out the Pokémon Centre at Hiroshima Station was not opening until 30 minutes after we departed.

Sake barrels at a shrine.

Our bullet train to Shin-Osaka took about an hour-and-a-half and was fine apart from a little luggage rearrangement after we inadvertently stored our gear in a reserved section. Oops.

Sounds like a smooth day, right? Wrong. Shin-Osaka was pandemonium wrapped in stress wrapped in sweat.

We exited the Shinkansen platforms and started following signs directing us to trains for the airport until those signs just stopped. We found a gate that a station officer told us was not the gate we were looking for. His Jedi mind control worked and we backtracked to another gate where a different station officer told us we had been in the right place originally. Sigh. Stress was building. We only had 30 minutes to make our connection and apparently it was only a three-minute walk between platforms. Yeah right.

We went through a gate to officially exit the Shinkansen lines and found the gates to access the airport trains. Our problems got worse from here. The tickets I’d printed were completely different for the airport line because it was a different system. The QR codes I scanned weren’t registering. A third station officer, let’s call him SO3, said these were ticket reservations and I need to scan the code at a machine to be issued with the actual tickets. Fine. I found the machines and they would accept the QR codes either. Time was ticking away - 10 minutes until our train. I headed back to SO3 who came with me to the machine to try and get the tickets issued himself. No dice. It didn’t like him either. SO3 said I would need to visit the ticket office and get them to print the tickets for me. Five minutes to go.

Random picture of Kairi in Kyoto.

The ticket office was nearby but had a line in the style of Services NSW where someone at the door asks what you need and issues you a waiting number for the right department. SO4 asked me what I was after then told me they couldn’t help me. They weren’t printing tickets in this office. I needed to go to the information centre. Where might that be, I ask. About 300m that way, SO4 replied. He even gave me a map which didn’t inspire much confidence this information centre was easily located. Three minutes.

Ah yes, there’s nothing quite like that rising wave of panic when you’re in a foreign country and have to be somewhere by a certain time and have no fucking idea what you’re doing. I channeled my inner Kel Knight and power-walked cute little arse over there. I found it easily enough then joined the line for the counter about the time our train left the station. Once I got the front of the line SO5 told me the reason the machine didn’t issue the tickets is because they needed our passport information and not all machines have passport scanners. This would have been helpful information if it was written down anywhere. But it wasn’t. Notwithstanding the fact I see no reason why they need passport information for someone catching a train to an airport. Just give me a bloody ticket. What if I just wanted to go and farewell a friend who was leaving the country. Ridiculous.

Me at Shin-Osaka.

SO5 eventually printed tickets that allowed us to catch a train 30 minutes later than planned. The amount of paperwork was nuts. She gave me back my printed QR codes which had now been stamped along with five receipts, five tickets to get through the gates and five tickets that couldn’t be used at gates but showed what carriage and seats we’d been allocated. Just print it on one bloody thing. Honestly.

I then Kel Knighted myself back to the airport gate which my family thought I’d abandoned them at to begin a new life in Japan as an expert shuriken-throwing ninja and we finally made it onto the platform. I should also mention the station crowds were insane. There were people everywhere and that only compounded the stress. We finally grabbed our train for the last leg of the journey to the airport.

The check-in line was fairly long when we arrived at the airport given we were 30-40 minutes late. By the time we checked our bags, went through the boarding pass scanner, went through security, went through immigration and then walked to our gate, it was only 20 minutes until boarding. There were no shops and no places to eat around us which meant we leave Japan without about 5000 yen I’d hoped to let the kids blow on useless souvenir junk.

We boarded our Philippines Airlines flight and left on time. The flight was uneventful and we touched down in Manila four hours later. What followed was an insane string of security procedures I still don’t quite understand.

Sunset as we came into Manila.

Our flight landed and then we sat in the tarmac for 20 minutes while we waited for buses to take us to the terminal. I don’t know if it is a cultural thing but people on the flight DNGAF about letting the rows in front of you go first. After several people behind us barged through the aisle I just stepped out and blocked them until my family was able to escape.

Once in the terminal we waited 30 minutes to go through security where they scanned us and our carry-on luggage. We eventually got through and found her gate. We got the kids something to eat and waited for our plane to board. As our plane started boarding we got our boarding passes checked only to be told we needed to go back upstairs because our checked luggage needed to be swabbed. Apparently this is an Australian Government requirement. I do not know why. What the hell are our customs staff doing at their end of all this bullshit is happening here. Our plane departs in 10 minutes, I said. It will wait for you, I was told.

Truth be told, we were informed our bags would need to get rechecked when we left Japan, but the message was confusing. I approached staff before we boarded in Japan to clarify and was told no, our checked luggage would just go through to Sydney ok. Because of that we didn’t do this process immediately when we arrived.

One of our planes

I had to run back upstairs and wait in a line of other Sydney-bound people who had been caught out. I was eventually granted access to a lift down to the baggage basement where I had to unlock and open each of our suitcases so they could be swabbed, relocked, sticker applied and sent to the plane (I hoped). I then ran back to the gate so we could board but before that the scanned our carry-on luggage again. WTF? The only stuff we could have added to our carry-on luggage since the last scan is stuff from the shops within the secure area of the airport that would supposedly be approved to be there. Utter madness.

We were finally granted admission to our flight. There were still 11 people behind us I heard a staff member say. The flight departed at least an hour late because of this insanity. Nothing takes the glow of a holiday away quite like having to wade through airport bullshit.

The flight to Sydney went by quickly for some given it was an overnight trip so many people were able to sleep or snooze their way through the bulk of the route. About three hours from Sydney, however, things took a turn for our family.

Both Kairi and Emily got awful motion sickness. Kairi vomited four times before we landed. Emily was worse - at least seven times by my count every 20-30 minutes for the last few hours. Staff got over my constant requests for additional sick bags and eventually cut out the middleman (themselves) by simply giving me a whole stack.

Thankfully, as we landed, Kairi came good. Emily did not. She vomited again in customs, again while waiting outside for our Uber and one more time as we exited the Uber at mum and dad's apartment where we had parked the car while they were on their own overseas trip. At least our bags came relatively fast and we breezed through customs. Small mercies.

We chilled out at Redfern for about an hour instead of heading straight home so Emily could rest on a flat, non-moving surface. She had a snooze on the balcony lounge before we finally managed to bundle everyone into the car and drive home. Our plane was meant to land around 7:30am but didn't do so until 9am thanks to the Manila baggage dramas. I thought we'd be home around 10am based on all the initial plans. We don't walk in the front door until after 1pm.

And that is it. Back to school and back to work. Until the next one.

Sun in Hiroshima

We had no firm plans for our last day in Hiroshima so decided to head back to the peace park and see where the day took us.

We walked to a nearby bakery for food once we left the hotel. Teneille rated their pastry options and they were also very reasonably priced.

Once the children stopped complaining they were hungry we walked from the bakery to the peace park with a couple of stop-offs on the way.

We ventured inside a discount variety store in search of a suitcase. We’ve bought too much shit and need extra carry space to get it home. A search the night before had yielded super expensive suitcases for which I wasn’t willing to pay. We found something more suitably priced in Don Quixote, whose store mascot is a penguin. I think. Bizarrely the store is open from 5am to 10am so we resolved to stop in on our way back to grab what we needed.

A bra for your butt… Teneille wouldn’t buy it.

We ducked into a video game arcade for the last time and let the kids run around playing random stuff. Teneille took a liking to a shooting game that utilised a real gel blaster. Not sure if I should be worried. We also wasted too much money on claw machines and won nothing. They are a scam. Don’t play them. 

From the arcade it was just a short walk to the park where we spent some time wandering through the precinct to look at small memorials and monuments we hadn’t taken the time to look at yesterday in our rush.

We found a giant mound which contains the ashes of many of the atomic bomb victims. With so many dead bodies to deal with, cremation was the only way. Their ashes are here.

The mound containing the ashes of the dead.

We found a memorial for a big housing precinct that had stood at a certain point in the park. It was so close to the hypocentre that everyone inside died instantly but there was no way of knowing how many because a lot of people there were entire families. How do people know you are gone if everyone who cared to look for you was gone as well?

There was a giant peace bell you could gong. The inscription requested people gong respectfully and not with great force. A number of people we watched toll the bell did not respect that request. Tourists, honestly.

The peace bell.

We then found a tiny building in the middle of the park you could enter via a sliding door. It would have been no more than 10m by 7m. It showed an original section of Hiroshima street from the day of the bombing. The site was discovered during survey works in 2019. What they found was part of a road, the gutter and the entrance to a house flattened by the blast. A carbonised tatami mat sat just inside the doorway. Projections showed what the street would have looked like before the blast and you could look down and see the real foundations of the old city.

It was a hot and sunny day so the time in the shaded park was quite pleasant. We also walked to the very edge of the river where we sat and chilled out for a bit just soaking in the city. It really is hard to imagine so much destruction when you see it now.

The atomic dome from the other side of the river.

Once we were finished in the park we walked back to the apartment to start packing ahead of our trip to the airport tomorrow. Yes, we grabbed our suitcase on the way.

We don’t have an early start tomorrow but we do have a bullet train to Shin-Osaka and then a connecting train to Kansai Airport. I’m not stressed, you are.

Miyajima Island

So, picking up where I left off, the second part of our day in Hiroshima was actually not in Hiroshima at all. We left the Peace Museum and headed back along the park towards a small wharf area next to one of the bridges where we boarded our boat for Miyajima Island.

The boat ride took about 45 minutes. It was a small vessel that sat close to the water with rows of sits full enclosed inside. Low tide can get quite low around Hiroshima so the boat schedules are strict to avoid damaging vessels on the riverbed when the water is too low.

From the boat.

Miyajima Island is also known as ‘Deer Island’ because… well… I’ll let you figure that out. It is home to a number of shrines and temples, including Itsukushima Shrine which has a huge torii gate the stands in the middle of the ocean at high tide.

Hisashi, our guide, explained the Buddhist and Shinto practitioners had lived largely in harmony with each other except for one point an Miyajima when the emperor decided the sacred island needed to be Shinto only and ordered all the temples be removed or converted. One of the Buddhist monks saved and hid all the Buddhist statues and other items to give the appearance of going full Shinto. Suspecting treachery, the emperor sent officials to ensure the transition was complete. The monk pretended to be sick until they went away. How Aussie is that?

Can you see the evil in its eyes?

Once we disembarked we began our walk from the docks to Itsukushima Shrine via the shopping strip which was full of souvenir places as well as restaurants, food stalls and other bespoke stores. We bought Kairi a little cat thing to go with another cat thing she had bought earlier in the trip at Mt Fuji and now decided needed a friend. We also stopped at a matcha sweet store to buy a matcha set for one of Emily’s friend’s birthdays.

We immediately came across some of the island’s deer. There are two rules with the deer: Don’t feed them and don’t touch the babies. Hisashi added some extra rules of his own: Keep and eye on your shopping and watch your back. As if to prove his point, a nearby deer ripped the side out of an unsuspecting tourist’s paper shopping bag. Watch your back. Got it. We later saw another deer that had snuck up behind a woman sitting on a retaining wall and stand on the back of her skirt. She was unable to stand up and move and the deer pinning her skirt to the ground refused to budge. They had no food and had not engaged with the deer. It was just being a dick.

While winding through the shopping strip we ended up at the restaurant Hisashi had booked for lunch. We were to try the signature dish of Hiroshima and Osaka - okonomiyaki. While both share similar ingredients it is the way they are prepared in the two regions that creates the different versions. Hiroshima style is healthier, Hisashi told us.

We were able to watch lunch be prepared.

Okonomiyaki - Hiroshima style.

Okonomiyaki is basically a thin crepe base topped with cabbage, bacon, noodles and egg. It is then drizzled with a sauce. You can have additional things like cheese inside as well as prawns or oysters on top. We all opted for the cheese option which was also the child option because Hisashi said they were quite big so he always ordered from the kid section. He was right. I barely finished the child option. I thought it was very tasty. Emily and Teneille ate all theirs too. Kairi ate about half of hers after dissecting it and eating the bits she liked. Aiden finally met his match with Japanese food and wasn’t a fan.

After lunch we continued walking towards the shrine. Hisashi said there was one big rule on Miyajima Island - you aren’t allowed to die. Ok, I said. What if you are one of the 1400 residents on the island and you get, like, really really sick? You get shipped off the island, Hisashi said. Harsh. The island is a scared space and death is considered impure, hence the rule. We promised we do our best not to die today.

We made it to the shrine easily to find the tide completely out. All of the shrine’s boardwalks were passing above sand with the water having retreated for the time being. Little crabs could be seen scuttling everywhere and about 200m out in the bay the giant torii gate stood completely accessible by foot. We were at the island at this time by Hisashi’s design. The tides had been quite big lately, he told us, and yesterday he had been at the shrine at high tide with water lapping up through the floorboards.

The shrine is surrounded by water at high tide.

A local out for a stroll.

We wove our way through the shrine and then down a ramp to walk out to the gate. It is immediately apparent with the base exposed that the gate is not crafted wood placed there, they are giant trees that were felled and then plonked down to be painted orange. Hisashi said the wood was 600 years old and the gate, in fact the whole shrine, is not set in stone so to speak. All the structures are simply sitting on top of the sand, permanent but not at the same time.

Having hopped our way back across the water pools to dry land we started heading back to the boat. We stopped in at a dessert shop to have a deep fried momiji manju, a type of small cake with a filling that is then fried. Momiji manju has been around for a long time, Hisashi said. The deep fried version is more modern but everyone loves it. You can choose your filling. Traditionally, the filling would be a sweet bean paste but they have an array of options like chocolate, custard etc etc. We bought a couple of boxes to bring home.

The giant torii gate at low tide.

The boat ride back to Hiroshima was uneventful and we said goodbye to Hisashi after we docked. We had dinner a small Italian place next to the river and when we were finished wandered back to a couple of the monuments around the peace park to see if they were lit up at night. We then ran back to the restaurant when Kairi realised she left her cat thing there. The waitress had saved Mrs Meow Meow and it was quickly reunited with Kairi.

That’s everyone losing something now, by the way. Emily lost her bag in Tokyo, I lost the passports, Aiden lost his shopping in Kyoto, Teneille lost our room key in Kyoto also and now Kairi lost her cat. All items retrieved in the end, though.

Island life.

We finished our day with a leisurely stroll back to the hotel where I did another load of washing before bed.

We had a very enjoyable day, however, if I was doing it again I would have done the Peace Museum as one day and the island as another. We felt very rushed through the museum and the island had a lot of other temples and shrines to explore in addition to a mountain to climb. It would also have been cool to see the island at high tide. I could have easily spent a full day on each.

Tomorrow is our last full day in Japan before we back and head home. Until then…

The reality of Hiroshima

Today was a big day. We met our personal guide, Hisashi, in our hotel lobby before heading out on a day that would include the Hiroshima Peace Museum in the morning along with other important sites in relation to the atomic bomb. And then the afternoon would be a boat ride to explore the sacred Miyajima Island.

Hisashi was great and very knowledgeable. He had been texting me for days to tailor the schedule to our needs as well as the tides so we could get the best possible experience.

Hisashi took us on a quick tram ride to the start of the peace park that leads to the museum. Tram he explained, and not subway, because 300 years ago the city of Hiroshima would have been in the ocean. The city was built after Japan filled in part of the sea to create enough land upon which to build. As a result, Hiroshima is one of the few major Japanese cities to be without a subway because digging one wasn’t really an option.

Our first stop was the atomic bomb dome. But first, some historical context.

The atomic bomb dome, one of the few buildings left standing after the attack.

The dome before the city was destroyed.

On August 6, 1945, American forces dropped the first atomic bomb in history on Hiroshima. The bomb was detonated about 500m above the ground, creating an intense fireball that caused the surrounding air to burn at more than 3000C. Homes and businesses were immediately flattened by the blast wave. Then, everything burned. Fatality numbers vary depending on who does the counting. Some plaques around the park say 200,000 lives. Hisashi said the currently accepted figure is closer to 140,000. Up to 70,000 men, women and children lost their lives in the initial blast. A further 70,000 died in the weeks and months that followed from injuries sustained during the bombing, radiation sickness or cancers that developed afterwards. Victims were not just those in Hiroshima that day. Anyone who entered the city up to a couple of weeks after the bombing to render aid or search for loved ones is also considered a victim given their potential exposure to radiation.

The first site we visited was the atomic bomb dome, a building destroyed in the blast but preserved by the authorises as a reminder. Hisashi explained as few as 18 buildings in the entire city were left standing after the bombing. The majority of structures were wood. Those that weren’t levelled by the initial blast simply burned in the ensuing 3000C+ temperatures. The buildings left standing, like the dome, were of rare concrete construction.

This bridge across the river was the intended target of the bomb.

Only concrete buildings were left

The dome has been patched up and reinforced over the years to protect it from earthquake damage. You can’t go near it, although Hisashi said he was able to enter the structure as a boy while the authorities debated whether to demolish or preserve the building.

The dome sits on the banks of the Motoyasu River. A nearby bridge with a distinctive T-intersection design was the intended target for the bomb because it was easily identified from the air. They missed. Instead, the bomb detonated 500m above a hospital some 200m away. A clinic was rebuilt at the site in the years after the bomb but there is no grand memorial to mark the hypocentre. A single monument stands on the street, walked past by hundreds of tourists without ever realising the relevance of that spot.

Blink and you’ll miss it - the site of the hypocentre.

We continued our walk along the river. Picturesque today and almost Parisian with the numerous bridges along its length. Dad has said to me previously Hiroshima is the Paris of Japan. I see it. In 1945, however, the river was a scene of devastation. Hisashi explained that those who survived the initial explosion were covered in burns, exposed to ongoing heat and desperate for water. Survivors flocked to the river in an attempt to cool themselves. Authorities spent days retrieving bodies from the waterways. Stretchers on display in the Peace Museum were not used to transport survivors. They went back and forth from the river to collect bodies.

A huge chunk of stone from the dome building sits alongside the river, with many mistaking it for a bench. Hisashi said the blast in 1945 flung the slab into the river. Years later, a local man saw something in the water and dredged it up. It sits where he left it because the government has no legal right to throw it away. It belongs to the man by way of salvage rights and h less he gives permission it cannot be moved.

Not a bench.

A student memorial stands close to the dome in honour of the young people who died in Hiroshima during the bombing. With so many men deployed with the army students were called in to refill the local workforce. Many students in Hiroshima were working throughout the city to create firebreaks as protection against bombings. They were incinerated immediately.

We wandered a little further down the river before crossing a bridge and heading to the Children’s Peace Memorial. Do you remember the story of Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes. We learned the story at school. The kids knew of it and Teneille said she still teaches it. It is the true story of a young g Japanese girl, Sadako, who survived the Hiroshima bombing only to develop leukaemia as a result of her radiation exposure. Inspired by a Japanese legend that anyone who folds a thousand origami paper cranes will be granted a wish, Sadako attempted the feat. She folded cranes day and night, at home and through her treatment in hospital. Sadako was two years old when the bomb dropped. She died in hospital aged 12. She folded 1300 cranes before her death.

Sadako atop the memorial.

Thousands of cranes sent from across the globe to the Children’s Peace Memorial.

Sadako’s story inspired authorities to create the Children’s Peace Monument in honour of the child victims of the bombing. Sadako stands atop the monument holding aloft a paper cranes. A bell within the monument can be rung by anyone who visits and Perspex storage boxes surround the statue where paper cranes sent from schools all over the world are stored. Once the boxes are full the cranes are taken and recycled into souvenirs and other items. We saw a number of school groups visiting the monument in our short time there.

Across the road from the children’s monument is a building that looks, at first glance, to be a stock-standard souvenir shop and cafe. The basement, however, reveals it to be something more. A kimono shop at the time of the bombing, the building is the only site that close to the hypocentre to have recorded a survivor. Just one. An employee emerged unscathed after going to the basement to find a document he needed. It was at that moment the bomb detonated. He emerged from the basement unscathed to find hell on his doorstep and his co-workers shredded or vaporised.

The charred foundations of the basement where the sole survivor emerged.

After seeing the basement where wooden beams forming part of the buildings foundation remain charred, we walked through the peace park towards the museum proper. We stopped briefly at the memorial which contains the names of all the victims. A list of names which is still being added to today as more survivors come forward. Hisashi explained anyone in Hiroshima at the time of the bombing or who entered directly afterwards had a stigma attached to them for a long time. People didn’t understand radiation sickness or the illnesses that could spring from exposure. When authorities started trying to properly log victims many did not come forward for fear of being ostracised. Hisashi said his family experienced that secrecy on a personal level when his wife developed thyroid cancer. It followed her brother developing the same cancer. To their knowledge none of their family had been around Hiroshima at the time of the bombing but their doctors urged them to ask his wife’s parents. Her father, it turned out, had been tasked with entering Hiroshima days after the bombing. As the stigma took hold in the following months and years he kept that fact hidden. Another victim added to the list decades later.

The memorial of names looks straight through to the dome at one end and the museum through the other.

We entered the museum next and briefed the kids that they would see some disturbing things and it was ok if they chose to keep their eyes lowered at certain points. The museum is confronting to say the least. It contains various artefacts from the bombing like melted bottles, warped metal, clothes and more. But it is the photographs from the aftermath and first-person accounts that stay with you. People wandering the wreckage of the city in a daze, faces burned beyond recognition. Far too little medical aid being rendered to so many. Skin hanging from people’s bodies as it peeled off from the burns. Clothing on display was burned and still covered in blood. There was even the remnants of steps from a bank where someone had been sitting waiting for it to open when the bomb detonated. They were so close to the hypocentre they were vaporised but the shadow of where they’d been sitting remained. It was truly harrowing.

The shadow where someone had been sitting when the bomb exploded.

Faded with time but the shadow is still visible.

We went thought the museum far quicker than I wanted to but we had a boat reservation to Miyajima Island. The last section of the museum was more about the science and the politics behind the bombing. Hisashi explained the Hiroshima bomb carried about 60kg of uranium but just 800g actually reacted in the explosion. All this destruction with just 1.33 per cent reaction of nuclear material.

standing.

Clothes from the child workers who were caught on the blast.

Cemeteries were one of the few things to survive because graves were marked with stone.

A bunch of glass bottles melted together from the heat of the blast.

Hisashi said he had done this tour a number of occasions with American tourists. He said no-one ever apologised. I’m not sure I agree they should to a point. But Hisashi says they always bring up Pearl Harbour as justification. I draw a line there. Some 2400 lives lost - most military personnel - at a strategic military base during a war-time raid is not the same as the annihilation of an entire city of people going about their lives and 140,000 men, women and children dead. Those two things are not the same. Not even close. And let’s not forget the second bomb dropped on Nagasaki three days after Hiroshima which claimed another 80,000 lives.

A three-year-old boy was outside riding his bike when the bomb went off. He died begging for water.

Hiroshima is a beautiful city but it is also extremely confronting. Why can people live there? Where is the radiation? Hiroshima differs from somewhere like Chernobyl in a couple of ways. First, the bomb was detonated at altitude which dispersed a lot of the radioactive material into the atmosphere where it passed quickly. Secondly, the radioactive material used had a very short half life as opposed to the Chernobyl reactor meltdown which involved material with a long half life. Those two things meant Hiroshima was safe to inhabit within a matter of weeks following the bomb.

I will do the island as a separate post - this one is far too long already.