Shimanamikaido

Getting up to catch the 7:02AM train from JR Hiroshima station is not easy, though I suppose it’s easiest when you’re in Hiroshima. The train carried my sleepy carcass to Onomichi, the start of the Shimanamikaido. For this day I was to attempt to cycle from one of Japan’s main islands to the next via this system of bridges connected by small islands. Here is a map.


The whole thing is 77KM (48 miles) but there are hostels and so on along the way. I had done my preparation work; I knew to get the map from the tourist information office at the station and then I would rent a bike from the Municipal Parking Garage behind the Green Hill Hotel, 5 minutes walk from the train station. All planned out.

I got to Onomichi station at about 8:30AM and rushed over to the tourist info booth. The lady at the counter gave me the map but apologised because it was all in Japanese.

And indeed it was. All the place names in difficult kanji with a big scary diagram of the whole bridge network. There were some friendly cliparty pictures of people cycling though so that gave me hope.

I had to explore for quite a bit before I found the Municipal Parking Garage for bike rental. In my search for it I came across Pontefract.


In case you don’t know, Pontefract is an English town in the county of Yorkshire. It is also where my mum is from and so I have been there many times to see relatives and so on. It isn’t particularly famous or particularly pleasant a place (sorry relatives) though it does have a Morrisons. Anyway, I was frankly astounded to find it in Japan.


It was the name of a plant shop, a “Herb House.”


As you can see it was closed when I was standing outside it in confusion. There was no one to ask about why on earth this shop had that name, nobody to finally demand that Japan make sense. But really, the minute Japan makes complete sense it will wink suspiciously and then fly into space.

When I did find the bike rental place, it was underneath Pontefract, there were some polite ladies choosing bikes. The owner of the place, a large but small man in a white Tshirt, was barking orders at them. I saw one of the women make a, “what’s wrong with him,” face which I was also included in. As the women chose theirs bike I walked around wondering which one I should get. Not having ridden a bike for around 6 months I was feeling nervous about this whole idea.

It wasn’t long before the women were gone and the man in the white T-shirt beckoned me over. He sat down at a desk and I sat on the other side, there were forms to fill in.

The Shimanamikaido has many good things about it. Bike rental is pretty cheap, you can get the bike at one end and leave at the other and there are signposts and the leaflet. Online there is not much information, but somewhere is a Japan Cycling Guide with pictures and so on that I had looked through.

I was filling out the form as best I could, writing my name in katakana, the alphabet used to write foreign words. In katakana my name is ニク　グリルス The bike man looked at what I had written, sighed and demanded, “Don’t write in English letters.”

Now I don’t know about you but I think there’s a big difference between my name written in English, Nick Grills, and in Japanese, ニク　グリルス.

“It’s in katakana” I complained to him, he didn’t seem to hear me.

We struggled through the rest of the form and I handed over the money. He explained lots of things to me for which I used my pretend-to-understand nod.

At some point he became nice because as I got on my bike he got on his to show me where the ferry port was.

I couldn’t get my bike to unlock though, all the bikes in Japan have inbuilt locks that you use a tiny key for. Probably any 5 year old in the country could do it, but not me. He smiled and did it for me. “It’s different in the UK,” I said pathetically.

We cycled to the ferry for the first island, which was about two minutes bike ride from the shop. He checked I had the correct money and then shook my hand. The ferry left a second later with me on board clutching my new stead.

Two minutes later the ferry had arrived, it was a pathetically short journey but all the advice online says to get the ferry from Onomichi to the first island, Mukajima. There is a bridge between the two islands but it is not very cyclist friendly.

I got off the ferry and found myself on the bend of a road, there was hardly anyone, or anything, around. A picture of a bike on the pavement indicated the cycle lane which I thought must be the right way. I started cycling, picking up speed and easily balancing myself with my backpack aboard my back.

It was starting to get hot but there was a breeze, things were fine…

but not for long. After about 15 minutes I was unsure whether I was going the right way, there were hardly any signs and it had been a while since the last one. There being cycle marks on the pavement was nothing much, in Japan everyone cycles on the pavement. I stopped outside a small restaurant and went in to ask for directions.

Alarmingly, they had never heard of the Shimanamikaido, even when I showed them my leaflet they both looked worried – on my behalf. “Good luck” they told me as I left.

I carried on the way I was going and then turned left onto a more main road that seemed to be the right way. The going was hard as I was cycling on proper road now and it started going up hill. The sun was high in the sky and I was already very sweaty.

After 15 minutes I came to a carpark with some trucks but no drivers. I hid from the sunshine in the shadow of a truck and drank some precious water. I got going again.

On and on. The road became more scenic and sloped down next to the edge of the sea. I felt better now, and as I went around the corner I saw a bridge to the next island which I recognised from online.

But when I got over the bridge I had a left or right decision. Both looked the same. I looked at my map but after trying to fit the red lines on the map to the roads I had been on I realised that I wasn’t even sure what island I was on. I went right and followed the road down between fields and orchards. It was pleasant now, downhill and quiet, the road became much smaller and led into a small cluster of houses with a shop.

And another junction. I went left.

Onwards and I found myself having to stop more often to rest. The road came to a pitch black tunnel that I could see the end of, but was fairly long and looked unsafe with no lights. A steep path led up the side and I ditched my bike and mustered the energy to climb the path and see how easy it would be to avoid the tunnel. It wouldn’t be, so I braved the tunnel.

I came out the other side unscathed and grateful for the shade.

The road sloped down by some houses and then a large truck came along, it was going down the same road, next to the sea. I was just metres from the water, the view was beautiful.

The truck stopped in a car park with other vehicles digging at the ground. The road I was on turned into a hill and I soon had to get off and push.

A voice in my head, called Reason, was telling me to stop. I was already exhausted, hot and honestly didn’t know where I was. I was certain that I was lost but I didn’t know how lost I was. I also had the unnerving feeling of being somewhere I really didn’t belong. This was the back end of the middle of nowhere; there were houses but no one around, not one solitary figure. The signs were unreadable, my phone had no signal and the map was useless to me. It was all going horribly wrong.

Resting in some trees I decided it would be all or nothing and that I had to act either way and stick to it.

You know all those films, or should I say all films, where the central character has something they have committed themselves to doing but there comes a point where he or she nearly gives up. Well Western culture keeps this idea running strong: in order to achieve something you have to stick at it, you get out what you put in, never give up. In any story anyone ever tells you where this situation occurs you expect them to tell you that they put in the effort or they found the solution and got there in the end.

Well not this story.

I decided to give up, not just go down the hill to the tunnel, not just go back to the bridge or the first island. I decided to go right back to the man in the white T-shirt and give him his bike back. It was clear that this was beyond me. As I cycled back there were no people, no cars, even the trucks were gone.

I got more lost trying to find the way back. I cycled along roads desperately trying to remember any familiar houses or trees or anything. After trying many identical roads I eventually found the tunnel and it was my hallelujah, I knew the way from there.

Back near the shop, well I thought it was a shop but it was actually a house with large windows and a vending machine outside, I got a drink and sat in the shade. I remembered staying in tiny villages in France as child and having a fear that I would wake up and my family would have left me. This was years before I knew any French and the sense of fear and helplessness the idea gave me was very powerful. Somehow I had gotten myself into a similar situation.

Back over the bridge and I saw a rare sight, a westerner. He was a proper cyclist in lycra, reflecting sunglasses and basically everything that proper cyclists wear. He was going the other way to me. I stopped and watched which direction he went at the end of the bridge. Instead of going right he went left and I watched as he rode along a flat road following the sea, it looked like a beautiful road; it looked like the correct road. Again I asked myself if this was the right path for me. I answered no and stuck to my guns.

Back on the road next to the parked trucks it got even harder, I hadn’t realised how steep the hill was but once I was over the crest of the slope the rest was easy and I sailed back to the ferry.

I was elated to get back to my starting point, back into a place connected with the parts of Japan I understood: trains, restaurants, shops, airports. The whole excursion from it had lasted over 3 hours and got me nowhere but upset and exhausted.

I stopped outside the bike place to remind myself of some key Japanese expressions for the conversation I was about to have.

“I got lost” I announced as I cycled in and the man in the white T-shirt looked up from his paper. He seemed surprised to see me, and then flustered. I was just hoping to park the bike and walk away but he insisted on getting the paperwork out again.

He needed me to sign to say that it was now all void, he seemed very nervous about this until I got out my Hanko – my Japanese name stamp, equivalent to a signature. He was then concerned that he could not give me my money back, I told him that it was fine, I did not expect any money back. He did give me my 1000 yen deposit though, which was a plus, and then I got the profound luxury of walking away.

On the way, cycling back just before the carpark with the trucks, I had looked up and seen a road sign about 10 metres above me. It said in English, “Shimanamikaido” and pointed up a steep fly road that joined onto a larger road. So most of my day had been spent entirely on the wrong path and although I then knew the right path it only confirmed my decision to take the train. The moral is, if you are on the shimanamikaido follow the cars and look up a lot.

I was so happy to be free of the nightmare of being lost in the back end of Japan.

I went back to the tourist information office to ask about buses. It would take two buses to go across the 77KM of bridges and get to Imabari Station

I changed my clothes from the sweat rags I had on in a toilet. On the way out again a cleaning woman looked at me and said, “That was the women’s.” We both laughed.

I put my bag in a locker and went to Mr Donuts. I felt such elation; it was like a massive problem had been lifted from my shoulders. I mean it had been replaced with the problem of how to get across to Shikoku by other means, but this would not involve peddling around purgatory anymore.

I was getting my bag out the locker again to catch the bus. I put my water bottle, freshly bought, on top of the locker where it fell over when I pulled out my bag. But it didn’t just fall over; it rolled, backwards, till it hit the wall. The lockers were already taller than me, and when I jumped I couldn’t get my arm far enough over to reach the bottle. I thought about stepping inside one of the lockers when I saw a big security camera on the wall right next to me. I did sort of try stepping onto one of the lockers but had nothing to hold on to when I tried to reach over. All in all I probably looked really stupid to who, or what, was watching. It goes without saying that I couldn’t get my water back, I had to buy a new one L

I caught my first bus ok; it seemed to be full of shouting teenagers. I listened to music to drown them out. The bus drove out of Onomichi and over the islands that I was meant to be cycling over. The views were stunning though, the sunshine so strong that everything looked new.

But then I was in doubt about whether my bus stop had passed. I went up to the driver at the next stop and showed him my ticket.

He explained that oh dear, my stop had been the one before that one. A familiar feeling of helplessness crept up on me, it was like I had been getting away from the place but was now discovering that it was just an illusion.

Two Japanese ladies appeared behind me claiming to have the same problem. The driver thought about our dilemma and thank god had a solution. Down the road there were some steps leading up a verge. He told us to go up those steps to a bus stop and wait there.

Getting off the bus I lead the way, partly because I wanted to get to the stop as soon as possible in case there was a bus leaving that moment.

The bus stop had a tiny shelter next to it which was a welcome bit of shade in the mid thirty degree sunshine. Studying the timetable, and listening to the two women who were going in the same direction, the next bus was not for an hour and a half. I sat down and started reading my book. One of the ladies did strike up conversation with me but it didn’t last very long.

The day was feeling like a huge struggle, the worst part of my whole trip by far, the worst part of my year and a half in Japan.

Eventually the bus did come, accepted my ticket and my destination was also the bus’s final one so I could relax. It took over an hour and I tried to get some sleep. The two women got off before me and nodded a courteous goodbye.

At Imabari Station I got a train to Matsuyama, somewhere near enough to where I was but also on the way to the ferry port where I could get to the final island of my trip, Kyushu, in a few days time. The train was slow and it was about 7PM when I arrived in Matsushima. I had nowhere to stay but asked at the tourist information, I was hoping that the guy would call hostels for me – I had heard that people did that for you in Japan. Instead he just gave me some leaflets and wished me luck.

I browsed through some of the leaflet and one place caught my eye. It sounded like a hippie hostel, where you could learn about astrology, aromatherapy, spoon bending and pay extra to talk to the owner about UFOs (in Japanese only alas). It had also been voted in the top ten youth hostels in the whole of Japan.

I called them and a friendly woman informed me in English that there was a bed if I did not mind sharing and no problem to come in the next hour. Things were looking up; I even had the directions to the place in the leaflet, by tram no less.

A large three story traditional bath house was next to the tram’s final stop. Looking at my map I followed the map up a steep road. Tennis courts and what looked like doctors surgeries passed me on both sides. The street lighting was sparse on this road but out of the darkness I walked into the light of some large hotels and the hostel right next to them.

Inside I took some slippers and met the owner of the kindly voice. She told me the rules of the place, there was a sort of curfew at 12, food at certain times and showers on the second floor. She gave me my linen and then up I went to my room.

There were three beds, two were made and the other was covered in things but nothing alive. I was trying to work out where this person came from, they seemed to have some documents with Japanese on them, but then I saw that they had a bottle of shampoo from superdrug which clinched it for me.

The showers in the hostel were odd. The shower heads all contained small green balls that the water ran through, I guess to invest it with minerals or some such. You could buy this special shower head and some green balls from the shop. I didn’t feel much difference but it was great to be in a hostel that cared to provide it.

I went out for some food and a look around. Everything seemed very traditional around the bath house, there were even people walking around in bath robes and sandals. A long enclosed pavilion of shops led on for quite some way selling souvenirs.

And there was a Lawson, I got my convenience food.

On the way back to the hostel I noticed a shadow. It was of a traditionally designed street lamp, but the shadow was caused by a bright flood light from the side of a tennis court.


I went up some steps to get another picture of the shadow but ended up with a blurry image of the bath house.


Then I noticed another shadow, of me this time, going down the steps between a stone torii.


Back at the hostel I ate my food in the now deserted dining room. Up in my room the other bed’s occupant was still absent. I got changed and went to brush my teeth. In the communal bathroom I got talking to a friendly Irish guy.

Back in my room it transpired that he was the one sleeping in the other bed. But this took several hours of darkness and both being unable to sleep to establish.

Miyajima

The Nihon Sankei are the top three most beautiful sites in Japan. I had been to one already, Matsushima (the place with lots of islands), and today I was going to another, Miyajima – a large torii gate standing in the sea around a small island.

Trains run from Hiroshima to the small harbour where you can catch a boat to the island. This did not take a huge amount of timetable detective work on my behalf, or even asking any questions. Instead I was able to simply obey the golden rule of going to major tourist destinations: follow everyone else. It wasn't just the foreign tourists either, that day was a national holiday so the train was full of Japanese families and school trips.

The first time that day when I didn’t follow everyone else was on the boat to the island. It was a beautiful day, I mean too hot but that’s a given in a Japanese Summer. As the boat neared the island the torii gate was in clear view at the front of the boat. However, no one could work out whether the boat was going to the left or right side of the gate and people kept swapping sides to try and get the best view. I stood resolutely on my side of the boat, which turned out to be the wrong side and explains why the following pictures have lots of people in the way.


The island itself is full of touristy shops selling the usual tacky souvenirs and overpriced ice creams. But the shops are in nice wooden buildings, there are stone lanterns and other decorative things that make the island quite beautiful.


Including a huge number of deer.


I don’t know how they got over there, maybe they got blown off course thousands of years ago like in Madagascar. One thing is for certain though, not many are leaving the island – I didn’t see any on the ferry. So the population is just going to grow and grow until they take over the whole island and form their own metropolis.

At first they seem very passive and idyllic making a deer city seem quite a pleasant concept.


But as soon as you sit down with an ice cream you realise you’re surrounded. Tongues abound.


Anyway, this is what the gate looks like up close.


This is perhaps not the best view, the best is to be looking directly through the gate but that exact vantage point is the most crowded on the whole island. And anyway, why do we bother taking pictures of things for which there already exists a million and one photographs. In this world of Google Image Search it would be so easy to pretend that you had been all around the world. You just download the images into your camera and say about everywhere, "it was nice," buffered by comments about the weather and someone getting ill.

Once you are there the next thing to do is to get the cable car up mount Misen. A bus runs from near the torii gate to the cable car station some way up the mountain road.

I found the bus stop just as the bus was leaving but feeling Zen, and full of ice cream, I didn’t chase after it. I sat down in the sunshine and waited patiently for the next one. After some time I realised that I was cooking and went into the shop next to the bus stop and pretended to look at things.

It was really nice in the shop, there were several fans blowing cool air in the direction of the sale items.

I was looking at puzzle boxes; I had bought one previously for myself in Tokyo. They are small boxes decorated with tessellated patterns. By sliding different parts of the edges in a certain sequence you can eventually open the box. The one I have takes seven steps to open but there were larger, more intricate, versions in the shop. A woman came over to me to ask if I wanted any help. She told me more about the boxes, one of the more expensive ones, it was about £300, took 60 steps to open. “60!” I said in shock.
“60,” she repeated impassively.

It was so nice in the shop that I ended up buying something – a puzzle version of the Miyajima torii gate. It’s a nice souvenir even without being a puzzle, and the shade was worth something too.

I returned to my bus stop, I was the only one there. Not having anything else to do I took out my puzzle and started finding the one loose bit by which the rest of the puzzle comes away. I kept at it for about 25 minutes until I had taken the whole thing apart and spread the pieces onto the bus seat. For the next 5 minutes I was trying to put it back together again. I felt genuinely Japanese, sitting at a bus stop working my way through a wooden puzzle with infinite calm. I probably looked like a genuine tourist as only tourists buy and use these things.

While I was puzzling I was faintly aware of other people coming up to the bus stop, looking at the timetable and then walking away. A small family had come and sat next to me for a while but they too had eventually looked at the sign and walked off.

After I emerged back into reality from the puzzle I took a closer look at the sign. It turned out that even though I had been waiting for nearly an hour, the bus would not come for another two.

I started walking up the hill and not far along was a sign pointing to the cable car station and stating, "10 minute walk, but 8 if you run a little."

I soon came to a Japanese garden that led to a small bridge.


Posing happily on the bridge was a young Japanese couple. They were both smiling towards their respective cameras which were balanced precariously on a rock. Considering my photographic skills comparable to that of a rock I offered to take their picture. Barely hearing my question they both replied in unison that no thank you, this was what they wanted.

It sounded like they had been asked this question a thousand times before, which is quite probable really: People readily offer to take your picture for you in Japan, and many other countries.

This couple preferred to get a more idiosyncratic set of holiday snaps with the same pose taken from slightly different parts of a rock at slightly different times. But can you imagine how dull it would be to look through their holiday snaps:
"This is us on a bridge in Miyajima. And this is the same but one inch to the left. Which do you think is best? See Honey, Mum thinks one inch to the left is better too."
"Well I can't make my mind up, let's go back."

Over the bridge and up some steps began the cable car.

The view was amazing and increased proportionally with the altitude. Looking forward you could see the long cable car system disappearing over the mountain.


Looking back and you could see how built up the mainland has become.


At the top there was another cable car, a larger one this time which led to an even higher peak. The young Japanese couple happened to be in the same cable car as me and we smiled at each other.

On the main peak there were many views.


But still this was not the top. The official peak of the mountain was another half an hour walk and scores 530 in altitude points (metres).

There were quite a lot of monkeys up in the mountains, and some deer too – building their empire I presume.


The walk up to the top was a little crowded and I kept overtaking people. There were some English speaking people there and they suddenly stopped in front of me to point out a snake in the shrubs at the edge of the path. Everyone who understood stopped to look at it, except for me, I just slid by like an opportunist.

Up and up, the path got narrower and rockier. Every now and then a small stall selling drinks would appear as if randomly around the bend. I think the price increased the further up you went – would make sense, market forces and all that.

At the top was a sort of restaurant with an open air flat roof – definitely the highest point on the island.

The top of the mountain looked like this.


And the ground looked like this.



I became slightly obsessed with an ashtray that I thought probably had one of the best views of all the ashtrays on the planet. Very hard to get the right thing in focus though.


On the way back down a deer was sniffing around two Caucasian men sitting on a rock. They had beer which they poured into their hand and were feeding to the deer. The men were laughing sadistically while the deer seemed to become instantly hooked and, ingeniously, tried to cut out the middle men and go for the beer can itself.

It can’t be good to feed animals alcohol; it’s just going to make them sick and ruin their football career. Having said that I’m not much of a prude because I can imagine that a TV show about drunk animals could be quite funny. Owls flying into trees, cats not landing on all fours, hamsters tripping up in their hamster wheels, octopi getting into tangled and dolphins just being dolphins.

Here is the deer before it met the ne’er-do-wells.


What an odd phrase ne’er-do-wells is.

I was pleased with this picture: a tiny yacht sailing toward a tiny island.


On the way down I decided to walk rather than take the cable car. One of the main walking routes down the mountain starts near the cable car and follows a stream flowing down the mountain.

The whole walk was shaded under the trees and was idyllic in the extreme. I was feeling really happy again and stopped to sit on a bench and admire the scene.

A large fly landed on my leg. In my happy state I didn’t brush it off but did become suspicious when it settled. “Do you mean me harm?” I asked it. It turned to face me and I got a painful sting in my leg.

It was a horse fly, or some other bastard of nature.

I shook it off and started walking again when I heard a buzzing. The buzzing stopped and I felt something on my arm. The fly had settled on my wrist ready to strike again. I did one of those tantrum movements people do when there’s a bug flying around. But the fly came back, landed on my arm again entirely unperturbed.

I started to pick up my pace to shake off the thing. I was listening intently for its sound, I couldn’t hear it but then I felt something on my back. It wasn’t paranoia either, the damn thing was there, I felt it fly away as I brushed my hand over my Tshirt.

There was no shaking it off and I resorted to running down the mountain as fast as I could to shake it off. My face turned red and I was in danger of tripping over. I slowed down but buzzzzz, the horse fly was back, apparently able to fly as fast as I could run – which is rather depressing.

I ran and ran and ran and ran along the path. Leaping from soil to stone to tree branch, half falling half sprinting down the mountain. I was determined to get away from the horse fly. I slowed again and STILL it was there. I was swearing at it by now, there was no one else around so I gave it the full force of my vocabulary.

When I emerged through the trees at the foot of the mountain my face was bright red and my Tshirt was drenched in sweat. On the flat again, walking through nicely kept Japanese gardens the fly eventually let me go and I was safe.

I stopped to buy myself a drink and try to cool down before I went anywhere with people.

The tide had gone out by this time and the torii gate now looked like this.


You can safely walk on the mud and go right up to the gate to take pictures.


I bought a hat from a shop to protect myself for the sun during my epic cycle ride the next day. Although I liked the hat I suspected it was for elderly women and was always a bit reluctant to wear it in public.

Later on when I was back in my hotel and telling Yoko the horrors of the fly saga she said, “I’m not surprised; you use too much gel in your hair, it attracts them.” This was not what I wanted to hear. I wanted sympathy not advice, especially not advice that makes it out to be my own fault.

Bastard fly.

Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park

When in Hiroshima it’s not easy to forget about what the city is most famous for. There are plaques on many streets displaying how many people died, or some other fact relating to that day: August 6th 1945.

In fact the location the atomic bomb actually exploded has its own bus and tram stop called the A-Bomb Dome.


Here stands the old Industrial Promotional Hall which, remarkably, survived the blast and remains today. The roof of the building has a dome shape and, though just a skeleton of its former self, its stark appearance amongst the gleaming modernity makes for a powerful reminder.

One of the walls where a window used to be.


Just next to the A-Bomb dome is a memorial featuring doves roosting on different levels.


Further on is the Children’s Peace Memorial featuring inspired by Sadako Saski, a girl who developed leukaemia as result of the bombing.


There is a belief in Japan that if you make 1000 origami paper cranes then you will get one wish. Sadako set about making the cranes but died before she had finished 1000. Her classmates made the rest in her honour and a memorial shows her holding a huge crane above her head. Long colourful strings of paper cranes hang around the memorial, donated by people all over the country.

The A-Bomb Museum is the largest building on the site and charges only 50 yen for admission, such a small amount that it may as well be free. When you first enter the museum you come to a large round room that explains the events leading up to the dropping of the bomb.

In the middle of the room is a model of what Hiroshima looked like after the explosion.


This particular sign really puts things into perspective.


In a way this is the only part of Hiroshima that stills looks the same. There is great debate as to whether the A-Bomb dome should be left standing as a morbid monument, or whether it should be taken down so that the city can move on entirely.


A large video screen showed black and white newsreel of the Enola Gay taking off, the bomb falling and the vast mushroom cloud bursting into the sky.

Later in the museum is a system of rooms featuring actual artefacts from the explosion. Melted coins and twisted metal signs give an indication of how monstrously powerful the force of the explosion was. People were turned to ashes instantly; one photograph showed a wall with a black smudge across it, a smudge that used to be a person.

Every turn gave another story of someone who had been lost; another artefact that had belonged to them and another reminder that it wasn’t just a country that was bombed, it was the people.

Further still into the museum and the displays talked of atomic bombs themselves, how weapons have been developed now that are far more powerful than the atomic bomb that fell on Hiroshima. Einstein and Bertrand Russell are presented with their Russell-Einstein manifesto on Nuclear disarmament. There are tables showing how huge numbers of nuclear tests are still carried out every year, especially by America and Russia.

There is one important document and one fact that the museum does like to remind you of. Japan was so weak by the end of the war that one official (I forget who) wrote that he was concerned the country was in such a state already that the bomb would not be allowed to show off its full power. Other documents claimed that so much money had gone into developing atomic weapons that really they had to be demonstrated in order to justify their expense. I’ve heard some foreigners complain that this point is overemphasised, but in balance I think the museum is focused on education into the horrors of atomic weapons rather than historical blame.

The most moving part of the museum for me was the survivors’ testimonies. A corridor with video screens and wooden benches allows you to sit and choose from about 20 different videos. There is a similar display at the Holocaust Museum in Washington and both really excellent in getting over the reality of what happened.

One man described how he was in school when they heard the plane fly over, then there was the most intense flash of light like lightning. A huge explosion was heard and the roof caved in. Although he was very close to the blast point he survived, coming to around his dead and dying classmates.

What many of the survivors mention are the dying people they came across, people who were severely burnt and unable to walk. These people all asked for water, but the advice everyone had been given was not to give burn victims water because it would kill them. Some survivors had tears in their eyes when they thought back to the agony they had witnessed and how they had not been able to help these people in their dying torment. Some of the survivors had given water, and then carried the guilt of seeing those who drank fading away before them.

Next to the museum is the Peace Memorial Hall which catalogues the names, photographs and memoirs of all the atomic bomb victims. Computer screens allow you to look through a massive library of information. The building itself has a unique design and feels very sombre. A fountain stands in the centre to symbolically answer the needs of all the dying who’d begged for water those 60 years ago.

The walls of the Peace Memorial Hall display a vast mural of Hiroshima with one tile for each of the victims of the bomb.


Step outside Peace Memorial Park and you find yourself on a busy main road that could belong to any city in Japan. Further down the road you’ll find passages leading into an underground shopping complex, perfect for sheltering from the heat. Young families try to control their tearaway children, teenagers yell into their phones, babies cry in prams, the elderly walk so slowly they get in everybody’s way, mobiles ring, music blares, people shout…

and you appreciate it all just one little bit more.