Hiroshima University and the Peace Memorial

Today we finally got a look at the countryside. We actually got quick flashes of countryside on the bullet train, but traveling out of the city on a bus to Hiroshima University took us through small towns and rice fields; lush, green hills and lots of people on bicycles. The meeting at the University was enlightening. After the delivery of many speeches -- something we’re getting used to by now -- we divided into smaller groups for a more intimate conversation with university professors and students. After much mental calculation and conversion from yen to dollars, our host professor said that it costs about $5000 a year to attend. Several of our group were ready to sent their children.
The first part of the afternoon was spent strolling through the lovely Shukkeien Gardens, filled with ponds and singing birds. It’s beauty was starkly contrasted with the sights we saw at the Peace Memorial. The A-Bomb Dome, whose ruins were left standing as a reminder, is just one of many monuments and museums to visit in the park. There were many school children among the tourists. The all were wearing yellow hats, which our guide told us makes them easy to spot in a crowd. She laughed and said that she didn't have to worry about spotting our group. Many of the children brought paper cranes folded in memory of Sadako, a girl who developed cancer after surviving the initial bomb. Read Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes for her full story.

Artifacts, memoirs of survivors, and descriptions of the awful events which led up to and followed that tragic event on August 6, 1945, would convince any visitor to join with the survivors in saying, “Never again!”