Hiroshima, Japan 13-14 September 2008

We had a flying stop in Hiroshima and, as we arrived late, started with dinner at a local teppanyaki restaurant/bar. Nothing much fazes us but we stood outside the curtain covering the doorway for a good 5mins debating whether to go in or not and disturb the locals.



The menu was only in Japanese, no one spoke English, we speak no Japanese and, from peeking through the hanging curtains covering the street-facing kitchen doorway, we could see that there was huge potential for some dodgy choices of meal! We ventured in and it was as we suspected. Everyone stared, laughed and continued to do so quite openly and with good humour throughout our entire meal. There were bar-type seats right at the gril and we waited for those to come free so we could watch and see what was cooking then point helpfully. We saw the below and thought, yes!



Tepanyaki is quick and these guys were firing out the dishes every few minutes so for us to take at least 5 minutes to explain what we wanted using a combination of broken, badly pronounced Japanese and sign language was just holding up the show! To say it was a bit stressful doesn’t begin describe it. We started by gesturing, using Japanese from our book and got a hands up, eyes rolling, “ohh, iie, iie, iie” (Ohhh, no, no, no) indicating that our menu choice did not come with bacon (as it turned out, it was pork that looked very much like bacon but we only found that out when we saw the chefs cook it for someone else!).

We eventually got into the swing of things and some of the things we ordered were winners – like the pork pancake: a crepe made on the griddle, topped with a small mountain of sprouts, onions, seasonings, then layers of pork on top, cooked for a while, flipped over then placed on a broken egg that had been cooked on the griddle. That was really good and the lady in the below looked after us really well.



Because we were sitting close to the griddle, we ate directly off it but the lady in the above photo took one look at us trying to cut this pancake thing up using the utentil they gave us, shook her head, dragged our whole meal back towards her on the griddle, cut it up into small pieces for us then pushed it back at us. It was very clear that we were providing entertainment to all those sitting around the grill. Some had finished their meals ages before we started but clearly were hanging round just to watch and once we got used to being a spectacle it was OK but slightly mortifying nonetheless.

One of the poorer choices of dish was something that looked so good at the start (see the first photo) but it turned out oh so awful. It started with four rashers of bacon bring placed on the griddle, then an egg broken on top.



Then came the bit that made it awful and as soon as I saw them my stomach turned. A handful of these brown (nattō) beans were placed on the egg and believe me, these are not just any old beans. They have the consistency and stickiness of something the cat brought up and hang together a bit like the drool that comes out of the aliens mouth in the movie ‘Alien’ - a sticky stringy goo that has the consistency of mozzarella but much thinner and glutinous. YUK. . They are truly vile and I’d tasted them in a sushi roll the other night and immediately spat them out. Those of you who know me will know it takes a lot for me to do that with any food.



Then the thing was rolled, sliced and slid over to us to eat off the hot grill.



So, once the nattō were in there, the dish was pretty much ruined for me but Euan bravely battled through most of them and very nearly made it to the end.

A clear winner was fried eggplant, fresh ginger, pork, onions and green pepper with tamarind or hoisin sauce. All dishes were served in a square of tinfoil and all tables in the restaurant had a huge heated plate inset into the middle of the table that the food was placed on. We’d eaten Teppanyaki before but London-style which is very authentic. We got a bit more clued up as the night went on and as the chefs were cooking, asked them to point out on the menu which dish they were preparing. Then we just kept count of where the choice was on the page (the eggplant was three from the top). I’m sure they breathed a sigh of relief when we left but the lovely lady who’d looked after us had obviously found out how to say good by in English and came round from behind the grill to see us off – hanging out the door, waving madly saying “bye bye, bye bye”. Very humorous and a great experience but not exactly the most relaxing meal we’ve had!

As we only had a day in Hiroshima, we’d decided to get up early and head out to Miyajima Island, about an hour out of Hiroshima by train and ferry. All was going well until it started tipping it down with rain ½ way there on the train and by the time we got to the ferry, you nearly couldn’t see the island for the rain. We’ve been very lucky thus far as it is the rainy season but we’ve not copped it until now. The island was very pretty and the famous Ō-torii gate standing alone in the water just off shore was still a lovely sight even in the rain. This is the 17th incarnation of the original gate and stands unaided, its own weight providing an anchor, in the water.

Everyone else sensibly had umbrellas but we made do with jacket and poncho..

Tame deer wander around freely and those that weren't sheltering were hassling a few people who had to run to get away. It was quite funny to watch and the deer were well up for standing on their hind legs to try and get closer



A bit random but I thought this was really cool. Like an alien made out of bolts, screws etc. Someone had a great imagination and a welding torch!



There are a few temples on Miyajima and the below is known as the floating temple



very aptly named as it was bucketing down and the view was restricted by the rain



The rain didn’t stop that day so it was lucky that we hadn’t planned to trapse around Hiroshima. Euan had this poncho that he’d kept from the Vietnam trip last year. It wasn't really raining, he just likes wearing it (just joking!).



The afternoon was spent in the Hiroshima Peace Museum and the surrounding park which was actually very pleasant and had some very moving monuments to the bomb victims.



There was a pretty cool peace bell that you could ring so we spent a bit of time testing that out



and seeing what it was like to put your head inside it immediately after ringing it



The A-Bomb dome is adjacent to the park and is the only building remaining from the bombing in 1945. This is what it looked like a few days after the bombing



The Dome is in surprisingly good repair given that the bomb exploded 500m above and 160m to its west. Even the bridge next to it, which was the actual target, survived but had to be replaced some years ago as the damage had finally taken its toll.



The museum at Hiroshima is larger than that in Nagasaki and two bomb-focused museums in two days is definitely one too many. Its pretty heavy stuff and the Hiroshima museum had more focus on the bombs effects on Hiroshima and its people than the Nagasaki Museum, which offered more history on the weapons themselves and what we were doing to the planet by developing and testing them. We’ve learnt more about keloid scars and how radiation affects the body than we ever thought we would.

We had a six-hour trek back to Tokyo on the Shinkansen that evening and while it was made very pleasant by being in first class we didn’t think the difference between the seats in the Green Car and those Normal Car was worth the money (we travelled in both). Something worth bearing in mind perhaps if you’re ever looking at buying a Japan Rail Pass and are tempted by the ‘Green Car’ option. If it were British Rail then yes, it probably is worth the difference but not here. We looked at the costs of travel without the Rail Pass and a standard one way from Tokyo to Hiroshima is around 18,000 yen or about £100 so it doesn’t take too many trips before the costs mounts up.