Dogs and ramen

November 22 2024

Hiroshima

Woke at 6am and did those morning things, centered around coffee. Hit the trail close to 8am and found a free shuttle bus to someplace so I hopped on it and ended up at a street car. The woman said take #7 and go until it feel right. Feels right turns out to be either one stop before or one stop after and ‘just right’ isn’t it. Though it was a very short walk to my goal, the ‘Atomic Dome’.

The dome we have all seen, ruins still standing with a dome at the top. The big one was supposed to go boom a 1/2 mile away over a bridge, but instead went off sort of directly over the dome. The people inside became fallout and the concrete stayed.

I was glad I got there at 9am, not too many others there yet, so photos are relatively people free. One man was there wearing a SURVIVOR vest, and I am pretty sure it wasn’t from the tv show. He was 4 months old at the time of the Big Bang, his mother is still alive at 106. He did mention she had cancer, but at 106 I’m not going to blame it on the radiation or fallout. 

This is the only city other than San Antonio that builds it’s tourist industry on getting beat up. San Antonio has the Alamo, here the bomb. They do a good job of it. A long very walkable city park, with the dome at one end and an archway at the other down a reflection pool. 

Okay, saw the dome, got the picture. Now on to important things. Where is the closest bathroom? Across a bridge I saw a building that said Rest, Information. That sounds like it could be a place to pee. Usually you exit through the gift shop, here you enter through the gift shop. I found the proper door at the end of the hall. I love Japanese toilets so far, the ones I’ve met all had the water wash your nethers button. Such a civilized way to sit and sometimes think.

I went to the 2nd floor and found a coffee shop, the 3rd had a nice story of Hiroshima pre August 1945 with pictures of the town and the people. In the center was a 20 foot in diameter model of the city before. I had never seen photos of the Before only the After.

On the way back down in the coffee shop was a piano, encircled with plexiglass. It looks kinda beat up so the plexiglass wasn’t just there to keep grubby hands off the keys, it was something special. The story is that a 10 year old girl loved (this) her piano. After the bomb hit, the piano survived and so did she. She made a vow the next day to fold 1000 paper cranes in honor of the people who died. She died a week later unable to complete her vow.

I can read without any emotion statistics. Bomb killed 50 thousand outright and another 20 from radiation later (numbers are not correct), but I read a simple story of a girl, a piano and folded paper and it makes me cry.

Time to get outside before I make a fool of myself.

One the park/mall there was a huge Cadre of people cleaning the sidewalk. It is beginning to fall and the grounds are littered with yellow leaves. These people’s ages run the gamut from teen to septuagenarian. Probably not city workers, and unlikely a jail crew. No they are all volunteers doing their city a public service. Some have regular brooms, some witch brooms, and then there are the one with little sticks cleaning out the cracks and the base of stair steps. I didn’t see anyone with a toothbrush following but they might come later..

Enough bomb stuff, it’s time to explore. Apple Maps says there is a castle over there so let’s follow the blue line. No ! wait, there is a festival of something over there. Wait ! Starbucks ?!? Let’s go to Starbucks !!

Starbucks won. My friend M’s girlfriend M, used to work as a barista and loves most things Starbucks, but I guess working there was the one outlier. S’bucks knows how to market it’s product. They have a series of coffee mugs for sale titles “Been there”, where the country you are in has a special mug. They also have them for the US states and I am not sure about Japan, whether their  mugs are city or ‘state’, regardless, she collects them and I got her a Hiroshima mug. 

Okay, get you mind back on your job - castle. Wait ! There are two poodles in a pram that said yes when I asked if I could talk to them. Mmm.. lots of dog lick kisses and some ears scratched. Maybe I should have asked the people first. 

Oh, ya ! Castle. I didn’t see anyone I knew trying to find the castle. I did find it but only after getting lost in the lair of the mole people at a simple intersection. The castle was pretty. It was there until August 1945 and then gone and then it was resurrected in the 1950’s in it’s current form. I am sure it is nice inside, but I used to live in a 1950’s house, so I’ll pass on this one.

There is an actual Shinto shrine on the property that was worth a stop. At train stations if you look around you can find big rubber stamps and ink pads with a design of something specific for that station. There are blank books specifically printed for collection of these stamps. At shrines there are similar things but a priest makes the stamp impression and then in calligraphic lettering write the date or a blessing. I bought a book and got my first one here.

Back to the mole intersection and back to the festival. It’s a Ramen Festival !! Get a 900 Yen ticket ($5) and take your pick of, must have been 20 stalls, ramen. Some smelled fishy, some had pictures of tofu or tuna or nori. I got a basic ramen with pork. I would have gone more exotic, but I kind of have a slight allergy to lines. Call it a ‘sensitivity’. I found an open seat and it was chopstick time. Don’t be the tourist that makes a fool of herself, by dumping a stick full of noodles in your lap. I did ok. A couple sat next to me, it is correct manners to bring a wad of noodles into your mouth and then slurp and suck the rest in - and no quiet slurping allowed ! It was funny seeing this prim put together young woman leaning over a bowl of noodles like a hungry prisoner sucking up noodles. Noisily.

There was so much food, I didn’t finish it, and on the good side, all the food landed in my tummy and not in my lap.

One of the presenters on YouTube went to this certain building in town. on the top floor it overlooks the Atomic dome and has an adults circular slide down 2 or 3 floors from the top for the adults. Also there is a spot  there that will show you how to fold an Origami crane which you then drop into a slot. The slot feeds a enclosed clear box that runs 11 stories tall, from the ground to the top floor. You can see it from across the street and it is now nearly to the 4th floor. Well that sounds like fun, but not $12 worth of fun. When I saw the price of admission, maybe the $10 Osaka building was a bargain.

There is no time to explore farther afield, so back to the ship to exchange tales of exploration and awe with my fellow passengers. Ahoy.