DAY TWO

Sitting here in Hiroshima.
Yesterday was crazy. Had a breakfast buffet at the hotel, which was supposed to be youshouku(western style food) but really it was japanese food with like sausage and eggs and bacon... then we went off to Himeji and Himeji Castle! It was ginormous. There was this beautiful mote around it and one section that was enclosed by cherry trees (although not in bloom now, still pretty). We go up to walk around the castle and we meet this little Japanese woman named Yoshiko Nakamura who was a volunteer tour guide at the  castle who gave us a tour along with these two Italian people (I don't think they were a couple? But maybe they were, I was confused)who were really nice. She gave us the greater picture of what Japan's history was like when the castle was prominent and during the different periods and stuff. She was great!! She reallyy knows what she's talking about. She said I think she's been giving tours for twenty eight years (as a volunteer!!!) to practice her english! It was so good too!!! She was incredible and adorable. The castle was actually being renovated and has been for a couple years now so we got to go inside and see how the renovation works and stuff. The airconditioning was probably the best part.. no just kidding. But really. Anyway, the castle architecture was really unlike anything I'd seen or expected to see in a castle. Yoshiko told us that it was considered a lucky castle because it was one of the only four that hadn't been totally rebuilt and that withstood earthquakes and battles and had never been taken or destroyed or anything really. The doorways were really short (Jeff had to crouch) and there were these rectangular steps in the doorways so that enemy troops would trip and all fall. The walls were angular so then enemy couldn't climb up adequately and there were no rain gutters on the walls for the enemy to attach their hooks to to scale it. the stairs were all different sizes to make it harder and the whole place is set up to be really confusing, which is probably why no one had penetrated it yet. She walked us through this long winding hall that was where Princess Sen had stayed for ten years. The whole thing was pretty fascinating all around. From there we went to Hiroshima where we saw the Atomic Bomb Dome, walked through the Peace Park, and into the Peace Memorial Museum. That whole experience was really heavy. We looked at the Dome for a while, which is a miracle in itself when you look at how the city was destroyed. Then we went to Sadako's monument. A lot of American kids read that book pretty young, according to Sensei-sama. It's about a little girl who got radiation poisoning around age two and I think by age twelve developed Leukemia? Or before that, the ages are sketchy for me, but anyway, she was in the hospital and thought she could save herself and grant her wish if she folded one thousand paper cranes. She only got to 500 before she died and her classmates folded the rest for her in memory. It was really sad. There are thousands of cranes in glass cases around the monument, it was really beautiful. Apparently a couple of years ago, some vandals destroyed all the cranes in a fire and the amount of cranes the society received increased by four times. From there we went through the peace park and looked at the monument and the shallow lake thing that was really pretty, then into the museum. This was the hardest. I cried a little. The images of the people burnt by fire and the whole atomic bomb thing were just mind blowing. It made me feel a little bit sick. We saw items that were burnt and deformed and pictures of people and Sadako and there were videos. I was very sad coming out. So we all sat on a bench waiting for the others to come out (Sugi and I came out first) then we split for dinner. We had Hiroshima style Okonomi Yaki! So tasty. Then back to the hotel where I couldn't stop laughing for the hilarious company and talk. Then I took an ofuro and bonded a little bit with Juliana.. She's such a crack up I love her. I didn't sleep very well though and my back kind of hurts. But then I never really sleep well in hotels  I guess.. Off to Miyajima today! (Really famous shrine) SWIMMING IN THE OCEAN SO EXCITED.
Jya~