He'll Save Children...But Not The British Children

For our farewell tour we planned to go to Osaka, Hiroshima (which I have learned the proper way to pronounce is the way the Americans do – hirro-sheema, and not, for the first time ever, the way the British do 'hih-rosh-imma), and Tokyo. I have travelled somewhat around Asia in my time here, but never really Japan. We complained initially about the ridiculous cost of travelling. Everyone we’ve met has said the same thing – travelling in Japan is expensive relative to the cost of living. In fact the cost of living is high itself. We both had visions of saving oodles of cash here, only to discover we were living with London rates.

First stop was Osaka. When you travel somewhere in Japan people always comment on so-and-so city’s ‘famous’ thing. Toyama, for example, is famous in Japan for it’s squid and pears. I can tell you from experience that only Toyamans think this. Osaka is famous, apparently, for it’s aquarium, which is the biggest in Japan and has a whale shark. It was all very impressive; my favourite part was the absurd-looking Ocean Sunfish. This was also pretty cool:



Osaka is also famous for its castle – Osaka Castle it’s called, you might have heard of it. From the outside it looks like a grand old thing; what used to be a small town and a network of moats surrounding the castle is now parkland that has been allowed, strangely for Japan, to gloriously take over. Inside however you would not know it was a castle at all but a very modern seven story museum. The ramparts (with osaka in the background).




So far wherever I’ve travelled in Asia there are districts that sell one thing. In Seoul you might have the hat district, the jewellery district, the handkerchief district. I thought it was very strange and not entirely conducive to healthy competition. In Osaka they have a kitchen supplies district where we bought a cloth banner to hang over our kitchen in our as yet undetermined house, and of course fake plastic sushi.

After Osaka we took the shinkansen (high-speed train) to Hiroshima. We were going to stay at a youth hostel in Miyajiomaguchi just outside Hiroshima, but after one night of the dirty cramped beds and vile smelling communal kitchen/living room/reception/smoking area we decided to splurge and stay in a hotel. If you ever go to Hiroshima stay at Hotel Flex. That is all.

Just off the coast of Hiroshima is an island called Miyajima famous for its Torii Gate (or just torii, as torii means gate. It’s like saying PIN (personal identification number) number or Mount Fujiyama (‘yama’ meaning mountain, indeed 'jima' means island so visiting Miyajima island is, oh never mind). I realise this is not interesting for you, but it irks me strangely.





If the first atomic bomb hadn’t been exploded over Hiroshima I’m not sure people would be so keen to go there today, which is a shame because it’s a lovely laid back, and strangely well-planned, city. I learned there that nuclear weapons are exploded over the target for maximum effect – an interesting yet morbid fact I think you’ll agree. Incidentally, it is no surprise that every monument in Hiroshima has the prefix ‘peace’ – Peace Park, Peace Memorial Museum, peace so and so and so. As a Japanese city it is set apart by its internationalist outlook, compared to the monoculture of the rest of Japan. The Peace Memorial Museum was not as horrific as I had expected and also was not coy about the militaristic history of Japan, unlike Japanese school history textbooks which rarely refer specifically to Japan's imperialistic past. Here are some photos, and yes that is me wearing a summer yukata.




Robin in front of the latest batch of paper cranes to arrive at the Chilren's Peace Monument


And on to Tokyo to see James and his lovely wife Hiromi. We’ve been to Tokyo several times and didn’t want to do it all again, so we planned a day trip to Kamakura, famous for having Japan’s second largest Buddha.


It’s not a hugely famous town, but it should be; it has excellent Chinese restaurants and Hawaiian shirt shops.

And then it seemed my bags were being x-rayed, and my water bottle being tested. I had been counting down the days until I could leave Japan and suddenly I was being asked to hand over my gaijin card; and it felt all too too soon.