Hiroshimayaki

Another poo in the nappy this morning - we are going backwards!

The A Bomb Dome

Today we decided to go to Hiroshima - not for the obvious reasons, but because their local delicacy is Hiroshimayaki - okinomiyaki with everything on - we had it last time we were here in 2006 and it was a good fooding experience.

So we got on the white train to Hiroshima - about 150 miles away which it does in 50 minutes and then the tram to the A Bomb Dome and the Peace Park. You can't come to Hiroshima and not visit this area. The museum here is fantastic, but not a place to take a 3 year old so we hung out in the park instead. The park has various monuments commemorating various groups of people who died in the bombing. The most popular is the children's monument which is very colourful, decorated with thousands of origami cranes. A child who was dying of radiation sickness in the 1950s wanted to make 1000 cranes in the hope that they would make her better - she never got there but the children in her class carried on for her and still now school children make cranes in all colours and take them to the children's monument. The whole time we were there we couldn't get near it - school groups were waiting in line to pay their respects - some were reciting poems, some sang. It is something they take very seriously - with good reason.

Running tom

There is no point trying to explain the significance of the area to Tom so we walked around and found a nice grassy area to play football with him.

When it came to lunchtime we headed straight for an Okinomiyaki restaurant that Matt had read about in a JR flyer. When we got there it was full of salarymen and very smokey (no non smoking laws here although they have got stricter on the Shinkansen - they used to have smoking carriages, but now they have rooms where people have to go to to light up. Same is true on platforms). When we arrived some men made some room for us at a table and stubbed out their cigarettes - how kind. We ordered The Tenyawanya Special, this included noodles, pork, squid, tuna, ebi, corn, egg, bean sprouts and maybe more - I can't remember. Anyway it was the biggest one they had.

Making Okinomiyaki

We weren't disappointed - all 3 of us enjoyed them. Half way through them the restaurant completely emptied and the owners started to make friends with Tom. It didn't take long and before we knew it he was running into their arms and being silly with them. They have a grand daughter so luckily were vaguely prepared for him - certainly a different experience to serving a salaryman!

Oh whilst we were waiting for lunch to arrive Tom was drawing on his magnetic pad.  Normally we have lots of squiggles and circles but this time for the first time he drew a train and it actually looked like a train - we were stunned and very pleased.

Yummy

Once we had said our goodbyes to the restaurant owners we strolled back through the Peace Park - had another game of football and rang the Peace Bell. We then dropped into a department store for a nose - apparently in 1991 the lifts there were operated by lift girls who were dressed completely in gold. Matt wanted to see if they were still there. Unfortunately no they weren't and we had to operate the lift ourselves. However, the toy area was good - ie lots of sample toys for Tom to play with so we stayed there a good while while he got his fill.

More New Friends

We then got the tram back to the train station to find out that we had just missed a train and had to wait over an hour for the next one - poo! We sat down for a long drink - it was hot today, then went to wait in the Shinkansen area where there just happened to be a huge display case with toy trains in it. Tom was happy and wouldn't be moved on so we took it in turns to stretch our legs etc. Matt then went off to find us some bento boxes to eat on the train, in the end it didn't feel long to wait.

We got a Rail Star Kodama (stops at every station) home. Tom fell asleep on me with 10 minutes and had a good 30 mins and woke up very sweaty but happy. We then ate dinner by which time we were almost home (the Kodama takes about 2 hours as it waits at most stations to be over taken by the non stop trains).

DOCTOR YELLOW ON THE PLATFORM!!!!!!

When we got to Aioi we had to wait 9 minutes on the opposite platform for the legendary Dr Yellow to arrive (the lovely Ms Ishino who has been looking after us at Aioi Station found out he was coming and let us know). Not only did he arrive, but he stopped (it was only 45 seconds but stop he did) when we got to the platform there were a huddle of other mums & dads with boys about the same age as Tom with cameras - we knew we were in the right place. Dead on time he arrived - he stopped at the end of the platform - not where we were standing so everyone had to leg it down there. But we got video footage and photos, AND the driver waved to us. All Tom could say for a couple of minutes was "Dr Yellow on the platform". So now we have definitely ticked all the boxes and Tom should have happy dreams tonight.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Hiroshima