Japan (more specifically Tokyo): the country/city of lies, future, magic, misfortune, and miracles

4/11/09
started writing at 16:20

The ship arrived in Kobe pretty early on the first day.  I got up around 7, showered, ate breakfast, went to the diplomatic briefing, and then waited for a few hours until the ship was cleared.  Finally at like 10:30 or 11, everyone from the group I was traveling with had disembarked from the ship.  The process took a while because Japanese customs required face-to-face passport inspection and we had to get our fingerprints done as well.

Jill, Kendra, Lexi, Marlee, Adrienne and I hopped on the train to go redeem our JR (Japanese Railways) bullet passes, which only tourists can use and they are valid for pretty much any train.  Then we bought bullet pass tickets to Hiroshima.  The bullet train goes at 230 miles per hour (I said 330 before but I was wrong).  The scenery flies by, it is crazy.  Japan’s public transportation is pretty fantastic (even I could figure it out for the most part despite not being able to read Japanese characters) and we are years and years behind in the US.  Country of future.

We finally got to Hiroshima and took a bus to the Hiroshima Peace Park.  We first came across the Atomic Bomb Dome, that is, the skeleton of a government building only meters away from the hypocenter of the bomb.  Crumbling brick, scraps of metal in the shape of a dome, broken staircases.  After seeing our first travesty of the A-bomb we walked further into the park, which was lined with the pink blossoms of cherry trees, luscious green grass, beautiful fountains and peace memorials, children’s artwork and folded paper cranes.  This city, that was completely obliterated 64 years ago, not only survived but you could almost say it is thriving.  There is nature, there is hustle and bustle, there is life, there is hope.

We made our way to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum.  It was about 4:30 and the museum closed at 6.  This was definitely not an adequate amount of time for me to take in all the information that museum contained.   I wish I could have stayed there for 3 hours or more.  I entered the museum through the East Building entrance and I barely got to look at the Main Building, because I didn’t know how many wings this museum had.

So I began perusing the exhibits, models, and photos that describe the development of the atomic bomb, the process leading up to the decision to drop the bomb, and how the US narrowed the target down to Hiroshima.  There was so much information and it was all so educational. The museum really didn’t feel one-sided at all.  It just laid out the facts, without pointing fingers.  If anything the museum seemed to blame Japan, taking full responsibility for their actions in World War II and the pain and havoc they wrought on other peoples. 

I came to one wall that was covered in letters from Japanese officials to other countries’ government officials from all around the world.  Letters begging, pleading, hoping for the end nuclear weapons.  Letters asking other countries to stop testing nuclear weapons, to stop researching nuclear weapons, to just stop the nuclear age all together.  Peace.  They want peace. 

Next I saw two replicas, one of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park before the bombing and one of the park after.  It went from a flourishing town of buildings, tree, bridges and such to nothing.  Flattened, burned, destroyed, massacred.

I ventured up to the next floors and learned some tidbits about the nuclear age and all the peace activities the town of Hiroshima is involved in.  I had been taking my time to read and digest all the information I was reading, but by the time I got to the 3rd floor a lady over the loud speaker announced the 30-minute warning.  I could only skim these panels of information.  The 15-minute warning was announced and I started making my way to what I thought was the exit, turns out it was the main building.  This building contained A-bomb artifacts, exhibits of damage from the blast, damage from the heat rays, damage from the radiation, examples of relief activities, stories from survivors, graphic pictures of those who survived and those who perished, and messages of peace.  A lot of really interesting, really intense, really heartbreaking things and I could only look at it for 15 minutes. 

Perhaps 15 minutes protected me from really delving into the horrifying subject matter in front of me.  I didn’t cry as I had at the War Remnants Museum in Vietnam.  Instead I tried to read and see as much as I could.  While winding my way through the corridors, I saw displays of charred children’s lunchboxes, tattered clothes, melted bottles, warped metal.  Then I came across something truly disturbing: the skin and fingernails from one of the victims, donated by a family member I believe.  God, how horrible.

By this point museum guards were hovering around us, pushing towards the exit.  My limited amount of time in the museum is reason enough for me to want to come back to Japan…but there are other reasons for me wanting to come back as well.  Foreshadowing….

Once we finally got kicked out of the museum, we all wandered the park a bit more.  Silently.  Reflecting.  Looking at the National Peace Memorial Hall, the Flame of Peace, the Peace fountain, the Children’s Peace Monument, the Peace Clock Tower.  Notice the key word: peace.  Hiroshima didn’t feel like an angry, bitter city – it seemed peaceful and serene. You’d think that everyone would want to rid the world of nuclear weapons after seeing or hearing about the catastrophic effects it had on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  It’s not a secret how horrible the atomic bomb was.  So many lives lost, innocent lives.  What’s the point of that?  I really don’t get it.

After we had some time to take in what we just saw and read, we went to get dinner.  Lexi and Marlee had split off from the group earlier because they were really hungry, so Kendra, Adrienne, Jill and I went in search of some good, traditional Japanese food.  We walked down the street and came across street filled with shops and restaurants galore.  We walked around in the shopping mall checking out all the crazy Japanese fashion.  I’m so jealous of their crazy kicks, hats, dresses, leggings, boots.  So many colors.  So many designs.  Aaaah craziness.  Crazy hair and make up too.  Jill and I stopped about every four seconds to ogle people and mannequins, wishing we could pull of their wicked style.

Then we found this restaurant that served okonomiyaki, which someone recommended we try.  It is this Japanese pancake-like thing but it has noodles and rice and cheese and eggs and bacon and squid, if you please.  And it was deeeeelicious.  And it’s fun to say.  And I’m finally improving my chopstick skills.  Yay!

Right next to this restaurant was a little grocery store, so we checked out the Japanese produce and snacks.  Japanese covers of American songs played in the background, the Japanese cashiers said their whole spiel to customers which I assume was something like, “Hi welcome to ______, did you find everything you need?  Thanks for shopping. See you again soon.”  But it just sounded like soft singing. The Japanese language is so nice and calming.

Then we headed back to the train station to catch our 9 o’clock  train.  We stopped and got cake first though.  Goooood cake.  We got back to the ship probably around 11 and Adrienne, Jill, and I did a quick costume change and ventured to a club called Second Chance.  As usual it was brimming with SASers and all sorts of shenanigans ensued.

Day 2 in Japan

Kendra, Jill, Adrienne and I hopped on another bullet train and went off to Kyoto.  We thought we boarded the wrong train so we asked the car attendant if we were on the wrong one.  He didn’t speak English and then one Japanese passenger in the car said something in Japanese about Americans and everyone laughed hysterically.  Meanies.   Not really…I think it was in good fun.

We got to Kyoto and everyone was pretty hungry.  Luckily there are little bakeries all over Japan with delicious little meat pastries, pizzas, hotdogs, and desserts.  Yum.  Any time you’re hungry just walk around the corner and oh there’s another bakery with a little treat.

So we bought our various delicacies and went off into a beautiful botanical garden to eat them under the beautiful cherry blossoms trees.  There were people scattered throughout the garden napping under the trees, letting the breeze brush over them and blossoms fall gently on their faces.  So tranquil.  The garden also had bubbling streams filled with jumping carp, all sorts of bonsai trees and other kinds of beautiful flowers that I don’t know the names of.  You would have loved it, Mom.  I thought of you.

Once we got our fair share of nature, we went to see the Golden Temple, a temple made entirely of gold.  After seeing our fair share of gilded temples, we decided to go to a Japanese bathhouse.  That’s right, a Japanese bathhouse – basically a public bath.  We walked in to the building, removed our shoes, and rented towels from the front.  The towels were a little bit bigger than a standard dishtowel.  A bit on the revealing side.  Then we walked into the locker room, put all of our belongings in the locker and walked into the bathing area.  And when I say all of our belongings…I mean everything.  Bags, purses, cameras, money, shoes….clothes….everything.  Lots of nudity at these public bathhouses. 

You’re supposed to rinse off before entering the public bath so we washed our feet and then timidly entered the big bath.  One Japanese lady started pointing at the water in which we were entering and gesturing to the wall.  Jill and I touched the wall and it shocked us.  There were electric currents or something being sent through the water.  I think the lady was advising us not to touch that area.  Ooh language barriers.  Then we sat in the huge bath for a while, but it was really hot so we got out and went to a cooler, more private bathing area.  After the initial awkwardness, we all sort of got used to just sitting in the water and talking….naked.  definitely out of my comfort zone and probably not something I’ll do again, but it was a unique experience.

After our bath we stopped at another bakery for dinner and headed back to the train station.  We had all brought huge, heavy bags for our long, independent travels in Japan and we put them in lockers at the train station earlier that day.  The station is huge so we were struggling to get our bearings and find our lockers and our train was scheduled to leave in like five minutes. We finally found the lockers, grabbed our stuff, and sprinted off to catch our train and got on just in the nick of time.  Then we were off to Tokyo.  Kendra and her mom had set up reservations for us to stay at the Tokyo International Hostel.  When researching the hostel, Kendra’s mom found that the hostel had no curfew (many Japanese hostels and capsule hotels have curfews) and that it had free WiFi (thus we all brought our laptops).  Turns out, last month they instituted an 11 pm curfew.  Bad news bears. City of lies.  Who goes in at 11 when they’re only in Japan for 4 nights?  Not us.  So we decided we would stay there one night since we were tired and just wanted to go to bed, and then find other accommodations for the following two nights.

We arrived in Tokyo at about 9:40pm after trying to sleep most of the two-and-half-hour-ride.  Now we had no idea where this hostel was because our Internet didn’t work that morning so Kendra couldn’t check her e-mail to get the name of the building and what suburb it was in. We literally only had the name of the hostel and that was it. Way to think ahead, I know. City of misfortune.

So we walked out of the train station and asked a few cab drivers if they knew the hostel.  None of them spoke English, nor could they read English so that wasn’t any help.  We were getting into a bit of a time crunch because at the 11 o’clock curfew no one is let in or out of the hostel, which was located on the 18th floor of a building…somewhere in Tokyo.

We started to get a bit nervous, so we walked up to four Japanese students and asked them if they spoke English.  They hesitantly told us that they spoke a little English.  We asked them if they knew our hostel or if they could write it out in Japanese so we could show a cab driver.  Not only did they write out the Japanese characters for our hostel, one of the guy students got out his phone and Mapquested it (or whatever the Japanese version of Mapquest is).  While he looked it up, the other guy student and the two female students chatted with us.  They asked us how old we were and told us we were tall.  We complimented their sweet kicks and nails.  All in broken English, but nonetheless we were bonding.

Once the one guy got the address, we asked/mimed to see if it was close or far and if we should take a cab or not.  They all assured us that a train would be faster, but we were reluctant to go on a train since we weren’t all too familiar with the system.  Time was ticking away and we needed to make a quick decision.  They students kept telling us the train would be faster and finally they took us all by the hand and ran with us into the station.  They looked up what train we needed to go on, helped us buy tickets, and directed us to the proper terminal.  These Japanese students did all of this for complete strangers just out of the kindness of their hearts.  This would not be the last time strangers lent me a helping hand.  City of miracles.

So we got on this train and got off at the stop the students had told us to get off at.  We walked out of the station, still not knowing what exact building it would be.  We saw a group of police officers so we asked them where the hostel was and they pointed a building literally right behind us. It was 10:50.  We ran to the building, hopped in the elevator, got up to the 18th floor and breathed a giant sigh of relief.  Everything worked out.  Thank God for those helpful strangers.  If they hadn’t looked up the address and advised us to take the train, who knows where we would have spent the night.  Probably on some street bench.

We checked in and then cancelled our reservation for the following two nights, because of the curfew.  We were charged a small cancellation fee but it was nothing too bad.  Then we asked about the free WiFi and they people at the front desk laughed at us.  Good one, right?  City of lies.  No free WiFi.  You could pay 100 Yen for 15 minutes and use their computers.  So bringing our own laptops was pointless and just another couple pounds to add to our already heavy-ass bags. 

At this point we were all dead tired and starving since all we had for dinner were tiny pastries.  Luckily the hostel had vending machines, since we weren’t allowed to leave anymore.  Sweetest vending machines ever.  You could order fries, fried chicken, hotdogs, soup, rice, or noodles for 300 Yen each and it would come out steaming hot.  City of future.  I got a hotdog and fries.  Hotdogs are really big in Japan and they come with great sauces on them. I was into it.

After our snack, we checked our living quarters.  Our room on the 18th floor had two sets of bunk beds and a sweet view of Tokyo.  The beds were pretty comfortable, but the pillow was definitely lacking.  Oh well, it was bedtime.

And it is bedtime right now for me.  It’s almost 2am and there is an early morning Easter service that I’m planning to attend tomorrow.  We get two Easters on the ship because we pass the international dateline tomorrow night or something, so April 12 comes twice.  Ah life at sea.  Happy Easter everyone!