.::* Living and Dreaming *::.

Last week-end I took a little trip down to Hiroshima because my boss said I had a couple days off work and George, the other intern, was already planning to go. So on Saturday, I got on the overnight bus to Hiroshima...alone because I had bought the wrong bus ticket and was going a day earlier than George. I spent Sunday doing a bit of shopping, walking around town and going to a contemporary art museum. That evening, I met some interesting people at the youth hostel who told me about their travels. One of the guys is a location manager for movies which was really cool. We searched him up on IMDB and he's got some really well known movies on his profile like Titanic, Man on Fire, Zorro, etc.

When George came, we did a lot of sight-seeing. We saw a lot of memorials for the atomic bombing of the city and we also the Peace Memorial Museum. That place is jam packed with information and I wish we had more time so that we could look at things more thoroughly, but Hiroshima has a lot to offer. We went to two other art museums, a really famous garden, the Hiroshima Castle and of course, we tried the okonomiyaki. At night we couldn't do a lot of sight-seeing since a lot of places closed by 5pm so we went to a pub to hang out or we went shopping.

For half a day, we went to Miyajima to see the Great Torii of Itsukushima Shrine. I didn't realize that this gate, which I've seen in pictures before, was in Miyajima but when I realized how close it was to where we were, I convinced George that we should go see it. Again I wish we had more time so that we could do a hike up the mountain but it got dark really fast. What surprised me were the deer roaming freely around. They would even come up to you and let you pet them. I had one try to get at my bag filled with pastries. It was really weird seeing them everywhere and interacting with people. In Canada, that is a big no no.

I had never thought of going to Hiroshima before but I'm glad that I decided to tag along with George. I learned that fewer people were going to Hiroshima to learn about the tragedies that had happened there and I thought that it was too bad since this place has a lot of important history associated with it and it really tries to promote peace around the world. When I first saw the a-dome, I thought it looked like a movie set. After going through the Peace Memorial Museum, I realized the significance of it more and I was glad that the building was made into a World Heritage Site instead of being torn down.