Tokyo Fox (東京狐)

Teaching Kids To Read Via A Penalty Shoot-Out!

Posted on June 8, 2013 by tokyofox

You’d think that after the penalty heartbreak suffered by Leicester City in the Play Offs last month that the last thing on my mind would be more penalties but this is a game to be used as an additional resource in English lessons for young learners ranging from Kindergarten to Lower Elementary or Higher Elementary.

To give you a bit of backstory, I bought a ‘Match Of The Day‘ annual four years ago for one of my students and inside was a game which I photocopied before handing over the gift. The basis of the game was just a dice roll with each number deciding whether its a miss or a goal. My initial thought was that this was a bit too simple and boring but that with a bit of a facelift it could be applied to helping kids learn to read.

This game features Premiership stars like Manchester United’s Wayne Rooney (pre-hair transplant) and the recently retired Michael Owen in a Newcastle shirt. It can be played on the table, floor or even the board with the students maybe doing their own scoring regarding a tick/circle or cross. If you need to make it slightly easier then you can place the number word flashcards (in order) under the sheet to help the students with word recognition.

This game may only teach kids how to read or recognise number words one to six but there’s no reason why it can’t be adapted to include colour words, phonemic sounds, adjectives of emotion or any lexical items. More balls could easily be added but remember that a dice only has 6 sides and 12 (2 dice) is an awful lot of balls! Of course you would also need to put a key on the board detailing what each number correlates to! The game could even serve its original purpose which was just numbers and that could be used as a warmer/warm-down activity or to teach playgroup level students how to read numbers. Whilst I always have this copy to hand, it isn’t so necessary, as a simple matchstick and goalposts drawing on the whiteboard can easily be substituted in its place.

Naturally, when I have to join in the fun in private one-to-one lessons I invariably try and lose to keep the student happy but its quite hard to fix this game (though I’m sure I still could!) as the result against one of my students below shows!

Overall, this simple game has been my most successful game/activity for motivating the young kids to bother taking the effort to try and read or recognise the words. He shoots, he scores! Game on!

Posted in English Teaching, Sport | Tagged additional resources for english lessons, learn to read number words, match of the day annual, penalty shoot out english lessons, penalty shoot-out game, Teaching Kids To Read, using football in the classroom | 2 Comments

Is This Really a Statue of ‘Oddjob’ from ‘Goldfinger’?!!

Posted on June 5, 2013 by tokyofox

Mention Bond villains and most people probably tend to think of Blofeld (You Only Live Twice), Jaws (The Spy Who Loved Me), Dr No (Dr No), Scaramanga (The Man With The Golden Gun), Nick Nack (The Man With The Golden Gun) and Goldfinger (Goldfinger). There are many other classic bad guys who probably deserve to be on that list and and one of the strongest and most brutal (according to my 007 Top Trump cards information data!) is Oddjob who was Auric Goldfinger’s manservant in the 1964 film ‘Goldfinger‘.

Displaying a perfect combination of strength, skill and loyalty Oddjob knew seven ways to kill a man with just one blow and as well as his unusual appearance and manners he formed the archetype for which many henchmen of the Bond film series were based on. His sharpened, steel-brimmed bowler hat became a famous and much-parodied trademark of the Bond series. Oh and he could also crush a golf ball with one hand!

Last month a friend of mine walked alongside the Kanda River one day on a mission reminiscent of when I cycled the length of the river back in 2011. One of the photos which he posted on Facebook particularly fascinated me and that was what appeared to be a rather random statue commemorating Toshiyuki “Harold” Sakata who played the aforementioned ‘Oddjob’ in ‘Goldfinger‘.

Although the character is Korean, the actual actor is Japanese-American and was born in the USA where he went on to be an Olympic weightlifter and professional wrestler and then a film actor of Japanese descent.

This bizarre statue is located round-about Nishishinjuku 5-1-3 and is just a stones throw away from the temple featured in ‘Lost In Translation‘ (2003). It is on the ground floor of a private apartment (so please respect privacy and all that) just before the second bridge if you follow the Kanda River from Yamate Dori (route 317) heading in the direction of the Sumida-gawa river where the river starts…or ends if you like.

Is this really a statue of him? There is some kind of faded inscription on the statue but I couldn’t read it and didn’t really wanna lean too far over the tenants balcony to catch it on film for someone to translate. The sunlight shining through onto the statue didn’t help make things any clearer. It seems like it has almost been abandoned but given that his nationality it’s not impossible that it could well be him. I’d sure like to think that it is, and given that the third Bond film is one of just a few 007 films to have eluded me so far on the filming locations front, this may be as close as I get to anything ‘Goldfinger‘ related!

Sakata died of liver cancer in Hawaii in 1982 and Oddjob may have quite literally died a shocking death but in this small statue he lives on in Tokyo overlooking one of Tokyo’s nicest rivers.

Posted in James Bond, Quirky Japan | Tagged 007 villains, goldfinger, kanda river, oddjob statue tokyo, Olympic weightlifter, professional wrestler, Toshiyuki “Harold” Sakata, Toshiyuki “Harold” Sakata statue tokyo | 4 Comments

Music Videos Filmed In Japan #5 Muse – ‘Panic Station’ (2013)

Posted on June 2, 2013 by tokyofox

The music video for ‘Panic Station‘ by perennial live favourites Muse was filmed in January 2013 in Tokyo during their tour of their 6th studio album ‘2nd Law.‘ This is the 5th song to be lifted from that album and is supposedly the first one by the Devonshire band to include profanity as it contains the line “Do what the f*ck you want to.”

The original video irked many YouTube users as it featured the rising sun flag (below) in the intro which was originally used as the war flag of the Imperial Japanese Army until the end of World War II and is considered offensive by some who associate it with Japanese militarism. It is actually still employed by the Japan Self-Defense Forces and appears in many advertisements. However, after an apology from the band it was later replaced with the Japanese flag and could be read as ‘Panikusu te-shiyon’ as the layout of the katakana script displayed on the video shows.

As for locations, this was the easiest of the ‘Music Videos Filmed In Japan‘ series on this site as it only really involved two places. The first one is the inevitable and overly-used Shibuya crossing (below) on 0:37 followed by the band fooling about on Center Gai street and Udagawa-cho which runs parallel to it. The music video was apparently intended to be light-hearted in tone, with the band members and a few costumed extras roaming around dressed as ‘cowboy ravers’ and other fancy dress creations.

Next up is the ‘Randa‘ store at 16-8 Udagawacho (below) where bassist Chris Wolstenholme is leaning against a motorcycle on 0:54.

Just a stone’s throw up Udagawacho on the right is a thin lane known as Spain-zaka which is a short slope between Inokashira-dori and the ‘PARCO‘ malls. A couple of shots of drummer Dominic Howard can be seen on 1:00 and 1:06 with places like ‘Bistrot Gourmand‘ (16-14 Udagawacho) and ‘Party Land‘ (13-4 Udagawacho) in the background.

Back on Center Gai, singer Matt Bellamy features in a couple of clips where he is walking along the shopping street (below) outside the ‘Family Mart‘ convenience store which is across from the fast food chain ‘First Kitchen‘ and its bright orange frontage.

Dominic is seen almost sneakily coming out of a hentai manga place (below) on 1:30 next to a sushi restaurant and on a small road between Centre Gai and Udagawacho with ‘Pronto‘ Cafe at the end of it. This is the 2nd lane on the right as you start off on Center Gai coming from the world’s busiest crossing outside the Hachiko Exit of Shibuya station.

Returning to Center Gai, Matt has now made it a few steps further along and is outside ‘Burger King’ (below) on 1:33 with the yellow signed ‘Matsuya’ (Japanese beef-bowl chain) on the right.

The weirdness of the costumes continues as a guy dressed up in a Halloween-type costume (below) gives chase to Chris on 1:51.

Halfway through the video (2:16) the action moves onto the ‘Robot Restaurant‘ (below) which can be found at 1-7-1 Kabukicho in Shinjuku-ku and with an entrance cost of 5000 yen (£32) I won’t be rushing to get in here. As it is on the second basement floor (B2) I can’t even really get a picture of it from outside so as a rather poor substitute I have photographed the place where you buy tickets for the restaurant at the same address so presumably its beneath here somewhere! One of the photos is of the Robot truck which drives round Tokyo promoting the restaurant. Those of you with limited knowledge of Tokyo should be aware (or may be interested to know!) that this is located in the “entertainment” and red-light district and is full of host/hostess bars, love hotels and so on.

The video does end back on Center Gai in Shibuya with some black and white out-takes (below) included of singer Matt Bellamy and drummer Dominic Howard. Both were shot at the same spot albeit from different angles with ‘ABC Mart‘ and ‘Bershka‘ stores featuring prominently in the background of both.

Posted in Japan Filming Locations, Music, Quirky Japan | Tagged muse video locations, music videos filmed in Japan, music videos filmed in tokyo, panic station shibuya, rising sun flag muse video, robot restaurant muse video, where was panic station filmed? | 8 Comments

Dining Out: Caravan Sarai (Afghanistan)

Posted on May 30, 2013 by tokyofox

“Dictation being forced in Afghanistan…” is the opening lyric to the Pet Shop Boys 1988 hit ‘It’s Alright‘ (video still below) and the first time I’d really ever heard of the place not that I would have been able to point it out on the map at the time!

The Soviet war in Afghanistan in support of a communist regime had already been going on for about seven years when the song was penned. The “dictation” most probably refers to the Afghan regime implementing a variety of highly repressive measures including suppression of religion and the closing of mosques. In the balance of fairness, there were also a number of positive reforms designed to modernize the country.

By coincidence, on the same day we went to this restaurant I had actually been teaching a student some stuff about Afghanistan. In unit 2 of the god-awful Clockwise Intermediate book there is half a page (above) about change in this Central Asian country including a listening section about a 1997 news item. It basically focuses on the Taliban Movement since 1996 and their extreme dislike of Western influences which led to bans of TV, music and cinemas as they were considered un-Islamic. This was part of the Taliban’s attempts to free the country from such influences which led to some kind of discussion about how the States influences Japan and what kind of things should be banned here.

Furthermore, I was lying in bed listening to an old BBC Radio 4 podcast the other week where an aid worker who worked in Afghanistan both during and after the Taliban period was being interviewed. It was an episode of ‘Excess Baggage‘ from May 2011 and it was during this episode that I felt a strong desire to vomit but that was purely because it was pretty much the start of my illness and nothing to do with taste for the country! Far from it, as within days of my recovery I took my girlfriend for dinner at this Afghan restaurant.

When I moved into my new place I came across this restaurant one day whist exploring the surrounding areas. ‘Caravan Sarai‘ is at 2-25-6 Higashi Nakano and is just a 20 minute walk down the road from the ‘Lost In Translation‘ (2003) temple. With two entrances this restaurant is part of the PAO Compound which is home to other ethnic activity such as the Egyptian belly dance show that was on the night we went there. The name derives from a roadside inn where travellers could rest and recover from a days journey with particular regard to the flow of commerce and people along the Silk Road.

They have a fairly extensive menu and first up we had a Yoghurt drink (above) which was lovely and that was soon followed by the delicious sikh kebabs (below) which were served up on a massive long steel skewer.

The gyouza-like dish above is known as Afghan-manto which came covered in sour cream sauce and boy were they awesome. With such an amazing texture you really will have a hard time finding a more perfectly constructed food item. Naturally I could have eaten far more than the five we were given.

It seems that a dish called Pashton Karahi is the national dish as that was the most expensive high profile dish on the menu. At 2300 yen my girlfriend and I decided that it was out of our price range. Instead we had a couple of karahi dishes (with naan) such as karahi hitsuji (sheep) for 880yen and lamb spare rib karahi for 1200 yen. A karahi is a type of deep, thick, circular cooking-pot (similar in shape to a wok) which is used to prepare stew dishes, usually with tomatoes (much to my dislike!), and they are named after the utensil itself.

As I mentioned before the menu is quite large and if you want to have one of the courses you actually have to make a reservation three days in advance which is I guess so they have time to get the ingredients in. The place was fairly busy when we went one Saturday evening with a few groups congregated in the floor seating room whilst us non-bookers had to sit either at the counter or the table seen in the pictures below.

Of course my main reason for going to ‘Caravan Sarai‘ was to tick it off my list of ethnic cuisines eaten in the vicinity of Tokyo but thankfully it was more than that as we had an interesting experience in a place full of character.

Posted in English Teaching, Food & Drink, Middle East Travel | Tagged afghan manto, afghanistan restaurants tokyo, caravan sarai, higashi nakano restaurant, karahi dishes tokyo, PAO compound, pet shop boys it's alright | 3 Comments

Zojoji Temple a.k.a. The Wolverine Temple

Posted on May 27, 2013 by tokyofox

So this is a bit of a first then as Tokyo Fox presents you with some filming locations for a movie that hasn’t even come out yet!! ‘The Wolverine‘ is the sixth installment in the X-Men film series and it is released at the end of July in most countries apart from Japan of course where the locals have to wait till mid-September. It’s fairly common that Japan is the last country to see an international film released but perhaps a bit surprising given that Tokyo features quite prominently.

Scenes were shot in late August 2012 at Tokyo Tower and Zojoji Temple which can be seen quite a bit in the trailer which is where I got the screenshots below from. The Main Hall is used for a funeral scene and it looks quite different from normal with the addition of lots of lanterns and cars going by where I’m standing, in presumably some sort of funeral procession. The Wolverine/Logan (Hugh Jackman) and Yukio are seen climbing the steps of the Main Hall with the sanmon (main gate) visible in the background.

Despite the Star Wars obsession on this site I’m not actually such a big fan of sci-fi films or even comic book heroes but any regular reader of Tokyo Fox knows that I have a strong interest in any movie shot in Japan. In anticipation of this release I have been working my way through the previous films to get me ready for ‘The Wolverine‘ which I will watch and later review on this site in the Films ‘Set’ In Japan section; the first time I will have critiqued a film of such sort on its release.

If it wasn’t for the fact that I have a set of Spider-Man Top Trump cards (below), which I often use in lessons to help teach comparatives and superlatives, I wouldn’t have had any idea who the likes of Professor Xavier, Magneto, Storm or Iceman were!

I can only assume that the shot (above) was taken either from a crane, helicopter or The Front Tower Shiba Koen although when I went up to the top on the 24th floor (and subsequently the 22nd, 21st, 20th, 19th, 18th….) I couldn’t get the view I wanted. For the record there is nothing on the 23rd floor and the views on each floor were all looking in the wrong direction with offices taking up space on the side I needed.

It’s also been rumoured that Nakagin Capsule Tower (below) at 8-6-10 Ginza can be seen at some point during the film which is a fine example of Tokyo modern architecture and was one of my favourite buildings in this article from last July.

For your information, further filming took place at the start of September 2012 outside Fukuyama Station in Hiroshima-ken and in Tomonoura, a port in the Ichichi ward of Fukuyama but sadly I didn’t know about that when I was in Hiroshima earlier this month. If I did I could at least have got a shot of the station in anticipation that a similar one would be seen in ‘The Wolverine‘!

Parramatta in Sydney doubled up as a Japanese city and Sydney Olympic Park was made into a Japanese village draped in snow. Filming also took place on Brisbane Street in Surrey Hills which was transformed to look like a Japanese street with Japanese signs and vehicles scattered throughout…according to Wikipedia, so it must be true!

This isn’t the first time though that Zojoji Temple has featured in a movie for who can forget its appearance in the Steven Seagal classic ‘Into The Sun‘ (2005) where the main hall could be seen on 66 mins in the foreground of Tokyo Tower (above) whilst there was some meeting between the baddies though god knows why they chose to meet at such a public place! My not-so-perfect match-up of that film is also above.

As for the temple itself, it is worth a visit in its own right and is included in the ‘Fodor’s Tokyo Top 25 Sights‘ guidebook and was therefore visited by me a few years ago when I cycled all 25 sights in one day. I have visited it half a dozen times now and definitely rate it as one of the best in Tokyo and along with Shiba Koen Park next door and Tokyo Tower nearby it all makes for a nice day trip within Tokyo. The two-storied sanmon was originally built in 1605 and is a rare example of early Edo-period architecture in Tokyo. After entering the complex through the sanmon (above) you soon come across a statue, the stone image of buddha’s foot, a purification trough and the Great Bell of 1673 (3m high) which can all be seen in the four images below.

I guess this temple is most famous for its rows and rows of little statues of jizobosatsu (the protector of the souls of stillborn children) which are decorated with baby clothes, toys and little windmills. Dressed mostly in red baby bonnets the statues are colourful and sad at the same time.

The building (below) standing in the background of the folded paper prayers and next to the Main Hall (seen from a different angle) is Ankokuden which houses the Black image of Amida Buddha and is used as a prayer hall as it is widely revered as a place that brings victory and wards off evil spirits.

The two pictures above show the Mausoleum of the Tokugawa Shoguns, which is not normally open to the public apart from on certain days each year. The other picture is of the statues that stand in front of its gate.

‘The Wolverine‘ is released in the UK, the USA and most of the world on July 26th. It comes out in Japan on September 13th!

Posted in Japan Filming Locations, Movie Locations | Tagged tokyo movie locations, where is the Wolverine temple?, where was the wolverine filmed?, wolverine filming locations, Wolverine funeral location Tokyo, x-men movie locations, zojoji temple | 18 Comments

Sick As A Parrot!

Posted on May 24, 2013 by tokyofox

Not only was I feeling sick as dog recently but I had to suffer the double whammy of also feeling sick as a parrot (if I can use such a sporting cliché!) after witnessing a heartbreaking end to Leicester City’s Championship Play Off hopes.

Back in February we looked odds on to be going straight up but then the slump of all slumps happened which saw us win only one out of 12 games going into the final game of the season on May 4th. Incredibly, despite such an appalling run of form we still had a chance of making the Play-Offs if we could just find something to win that final game. However, that game was at rivals Forest where we hadn’t won a league game for 40+ years and they were in pretty much the same position as us where a win could give them a Play-Off place.

Expectations were fairly low but if football always offers one thing then its usually good old blind, fairthful optimism! Believe it or not that was rewarded as a last minute winner from Frenchman Knockaert saw us finally win at the City Ground in Nottingham and by miracle we actually sneaked into 6th place as Bolton messed up at home in their crucial game. Our 68 point tally was the lowest total ever for a side reaching the playoffs in a 24 team second tier so there was no doubt that we were fortunate to have limped over the line but the next two (three?!) games could have saved our season and brought us the riches that come with promotion to the Premier League.

So Watford came to the King Power Stadium in Leicester on Thursday night (9 May) and despite being ill I still got up at 3.30am to see the game and glad I did as Nugent’s 81st minute goal proved to be enough for us to take a one goal lead into the second leg at Vicarage Road on Sunday 12 May.

Sadly, my celebrations of that winning goal were muted as I had no voice as was the same as Nugent cancelled out Watford’s spectacular opening goal. Thankfully this game kicked off at at a time that was decent for their one fan in Japan! The lunchtime kick off back home meant it was a nice 8.30pm start over here and to be fair Watford were the better side as we went in at the break level but leading on aggregate.

On the hour mark the home side levelled things overall, and with away goals counting for nothing in this game, the thought of extra time and penalties was to become more prevalent as the game entered a nervy last twenty minutes. I can’t even remember why but there was a somewhat lengthy spell of injury treatment as the 90 minutes came up and then incredibly Leicester were presented with an amazing opportunity to book their place at Wembley with 97 minutes on the clock. In all honesty it shouldn’t have been a penalty as Knockaert went down with all too much ease and having dusted himself down he was to be the one to take the glory.

What happened then was the stuff of nightmares as Almunia saved the kick and smothered the follow-up shot too but oh no that wasn’t it as Watford then charged upfield on the counter attack and when the floated cross from the right was nodded back and smashed home our hearts sank. If what makes football great can be summed up in a minute (or even 20 seconds!) of football then this was it.

The final whistle went seconds later bringing to an end our season in devastating fashion and yet again Nigel Pearson’s team had fallen just short with a French-mans penalty kick costing us as it had done two years ago albeit in slightly different circumstances this time.

Posted in Leicester City, Sport | Tagged 20 seconds that changed a game, championship play off semi final, knockaert blow, Leicester win at Forest, Nugent, sick as a parrot, Watford 3 Leicester City 1 | 2 Comments

Sick As A Dog!

Posted on May 21, 2013 by tokyofox

So having returned from a busy Golden Week’s Holiday in Vietnam and Hiroshima I returned from the latter on the morning of the 7th and went straight to work and apart from feeling a little tired I survived the day with relative ease. The next morning was fine too but as I was on the short train journey going to work I suddenly started to feel a little weak and slightly lethargic. By the time I arrived at school in Shibuya a short while later I was shorter on breath and had to lie down as I felt weaker in my arms and legs. Somehow I got through the rest of that day but when I got into bed early that night I was having slight breathing problems, light coughing and couldn’t swallow which made it quite difficult to get sleep which is what I was in desperate need of.

Around 1am I had to race for the toilet as I had an overbearing urge to vomit which (close your eyes if you’re a bit squeamish!) included a small amount of blood. A repeat trip to the toilet followed a bit later and I spent a fair bit of time just sitting on the floor of that room each time as I cooled down from a very hot night.

By the time of work that day I pretty much had no voice and I managed to get through the day with minimal speaking knowing that I had a day off the following day in which I could recover. That day was mostly spent sweating in bed, taking on lots of water and sleeping on and off throughout until my girlfriend got home that evening and thought it best to take me to hospital as the symptoms were suspicious of those linked to tuberculosis which had affected a family member in the past. I was given some tablets to take after meals which I wasn’t eating too many of due to lack of appetite. He said to take them for the next week and see how things went but he didn’t mention anything about bird flu which was the rather lazy thing that under-knowledgable colleagues were annoyingly coming out with. Just pure exhaustion was the more likely reason for my illness.

I actually managed to sleep quite well that night and went to work Saturday morning and surprised even myself by teaching with a bare minimum of words coming out of my mouth but by the afternoon it was getting harder and I was feeling hotter and hotter. By the time I got home I was burning up and felt out of breath and severely lacking in energy. Sunday was all spent at home trying to recover but it didn’t seem to work quite as I had hoped. My girlfriend was a great help throughout my illness and in return I kept her awake with my sniffing and mumbling! Oh and I also passed on some of the symptoms to her too!

History was made on Monday morning as I called in sick for the first time in all my many years with my present company as my temperature reached a (recorded) high of 39.6 degrees although my girlfriend reckons that I must have been well into the forties on the Wednesday night prior to that (before we had a thermometer)!

I returned to work the next day which was when I started speaking almost properly again for the first time in about five days and thankfully its been a slow but consistent recovery process since then. Even as I write this over a week later I’m still coughing a little and am out of breath more easily than before the illness but its all a work in progress and I’m heading in the right direction which at times I didn’t think would happen.

Posted in Japan Life | Tagged calling in sick, coughing up blood, exhaustion, feeling sh*t, sick as a dog, standby teacher needed, tokyofox on the brink of death, tuberculosis | 3 Comments

I’m In A Relationship

Posted on May 18, 2013 by tokyofox

If I can paraphrase a Facebook relationship status I can confirm that I am in a relationship. However, this is not exactly ‘new‘ news as my girlfriend and I have actually been together for a long while now but me being me I rarely talk about it.

In this day and age, with so much information and personal views and opinion “out there” on the internet via Twitter, Facebook and this site it is quite nice to hold something back and have an air of mystery about it. However, since I was spotted by a colleague in the Meguro Tavern British pub with my girlfriend and her parents a few months ago there has been increased speculation among some of my colleagues regarding my private life albeit on a scale miles apart from even the Z-listers whose private affairs still make it in the celebrity gossip magazines.

There have of course been a fair few references to a ‘girlfriend’ on here over the last year or so. However, given that the bulk of Tokyo Fox’s hundreds of daily hits come from people searching for certain filming locations rather than actual friends or family, these subtle references go almost un-noticed! I guess over time I will gradually phase-her-in in terms of making some appearances on here as she is now very much a major part of my life (of course!) but it may be hard as she has no interest in movie locations (why would she eh?!) or cycling adventures in and around Tokyo. However, the ‘Dining Out‘ series was started on here as a chance for us to share in a regular activity and hobby. Watch this space is I guess all I can say regarding her future appearances on here! Just remember though that its my name on the door so-to-speak and this site is still very much about my life, travels, teaching ideas and whatever else.

Posted in Japan Life | Tagged dining out in tokyo, Facebook status, meguro tavern, nosey colleagues, relationship status, tokyofox, tokyofox in a relationship | 2 Comments

Hiroshima Pt III: Peace Memorial Park & Museum

Posted on May 15, 2013 by tokyofox

The atomic bomb was dropped on the city of Hiroshima at 8:15am on August 6th, 1945. It was the first dropping of its kind in world history during combat and it wiped out nearly a third of the city’s population. The area has become a pilgrimage for tens of thousands of visitors from across the world each year. On the 62nd anniversary (back in 2007) of the A-Bomb dropping on Hiroshima I wrote a short piece reflecting on my trip there a few years prior to that and last Monday I returned to the place. Despite it being a repeat visit for me it doesn’t get any easier, or less upsetting or emotional and thats exactly how it should be.

The iconic ruin of the A-Bomb Dome on the banks of the Aioi River was the former Industrial Promotion Hall. I never tire of looking at this place and only wish I could investigate closer but of course that’s never gonna happen and looking through the railings at the devastation is a standing reminder of the unprecedented horror and destructive power of nuclear weapons.

Across the other side of the river is the Peace Bell (above) and further along the river heading towards the museum is the Children’s Peace Monument (below). This is a statue based on the true story of a junior high school girl called Sadako Sasaki who was only two years old when the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. She contracted radiation from the bomb and believed that making 1000 paper cranes would grant her the wish of being cured. It sadly didn’t but her legacy lives on and children from all around the world are still inspired to fold cranes and send them to Hiroshima where they are placed near her statue and these present messages of world peace.

Finally, moving into the Peace Memorial Museum (50 yen entrance fee) we spent nearly a couple of hours walking around and reading the rather substantial amount of stories and articles dedicated to educating visitors about the bomb. These exhibits cover the build up to war, the role of Hiroshima in the war up to the bombing, and extensive information on the bombing and its effects, along with substantial memorabilia and pictures from the bombing.

As well as the section devoted to Sadako Sasaki what was also very moving was the number of damaged school personal items (clothing, pencil cases, lunch-boxes etc) donated by family members of the kids involved with a short, personal story of how the bomb affected said child which rarely concluded with anything other than the news of their death. All very, very sad indeed.

Earlier in the day we had taken a quick trip to Hiroshima-jo Castle but having seen the far superior Iwakuni-jo the day before and wanting to push on for the A-Bomb Dome we decided against going in and moved on pretty sharpish on a lovely fine day.

Posted in Japan Travel | Tagged 08:15am, A-Bomb Dome, children's peace monument, Hiroshima 6 August 1945, hiroshima-jo castle, peace bell, peace memorial museum, Sadako Sasaki, why was the bomb dropped on hiroshima? | 19 Comments

Hiroshima Pt II: Iwakuni May Be in the Bordering Prefecture but it’s Not a Bridge Too Far!

Posted on May 12, 2013 by tokyofox

Whilst in Hiroshima I wanted to see a different part to what I had seen back in December 2005. Of course I was always going to visit Miyajima and the Peace Memorial Park/A-Bomb Dome but as there was another day free, my girlfriends parents decided that going to Yamaguchi-ken would make for a nice day trip. They were of course right as it was a beautiful sunny day perfect for viewing the five arched Kintai-kyo bridge which was originally constructed with no nails or nuts and bolts. These days it has some cunningly concealed steel reinforcements. It is one of the most famous bridges in Japan and was originally built in 1673.

Iwakuni-jo castle looms over the bridge from its position atop Mount Shiroyama which meant yet another mountain climb (we would go on to do a third and final climb the following day albeit much shorter) for us. The castle is not in its original position as Japanese castles tend to be all about tourism rather than warfare.

The views from inside the castle were very impressive as one could see out over the bridge and further afield. Every place you go in Japan always has a local delicacy and Iwakuni was no exception as we had a special kind of sushi. This was not rolled in seaweed but was made with a square mold and had some special flavourings.