Hiroshima, Mon Amour – the feeling of romance and mystery perhaps wasn’t as strong as in Marguerite Duras’ film as a heavy sky heralded in my arrival to this city, although I avoided the summer rains just long enough to take a quick and wholesome look around the city. Also, someone shouted this blog out on the Oxlove Facebook page, so if you’re the kind poster and you’re reading this, this one’s for you.
I’ll preface this with a disclaimer that I am yet to see the more important and meaningful parts of the city. That is to say, the Atom Bomb museum, Peace Park and the famous Atom Bomb Dome still await me. I think Friday is the day for that. Anyways, yesterday, I got out of Hiroshima station and took a leisurely walk towards Shukkeien and the ruins of Hiroshima Castle. It was still dry, so the Shukkeien Garden was a pleasant if not slightly sweaty time. But in the long line of Japanese-style gardens, this one is also just as hard to fault or dislike.
Hiroshima Castle is described as a ruin on maps and on the internet, although what appeared before me was hardly a ruin. Sure, all the walls weren’t there, and some of the turrets were missing, but it’s easier for me to describe the castle in Kumamoto as a ruin compared to Hiroshima. The entireity of the main keep stood strong, imposing its five stories high above the rest of where the castle used to lie. Naturally it was all destroyed in the blast in 1945, but the reconstruction is so good that one could have thought it had been standing there forever. It’s at this moment that it started raining, and it seemed like a good idea to head back to the station before jumping on a train up to Kabe, where I have been warmly welcomed by the Yoshiokas, my host family until wednesday. My Japanese is really being put to the test now…
We ate, I showered, and went to bed, exhausted from finally being able to set myself down knowing that I didn’t have to move for a while now.
That didn’t last so long however, because at 10 this morning I hopped on a bullet train to Himeji – and and I’d like to sincerely thank whatever powers that be (God, Buddha, Shrek, or some nondescript deity who likes me) for letting the sun poke its shy head through the rainy season’s everlasting fog. I don’t think it would have been appropriate to see Himeji Castle, in six-story brilliant white glory in any other setting than in a blue sky. It doesn’t really need explanation. It’s huge, it’s beautiful, and I couldn’t help grinning like an idiot in awe at what I was witnessing and how lucky I was with the weather.
The accompanying Kōkoen garden was sublime. Probably the most beautiful I have seen. And I can comfortably say, I’ve been to a fair few. It’s crazy how much just a little bit of sunshine can make even small rocks or mossy lawns glow in an entirely mundane yet sublime beauty, one that Sōetsu Yanagi would have probably been infatuated with. I’m also reading his writing at the moment; The Beauty of Everyday Things. It seems appropriate given that I’m getting a lot of rain and am trying my damndest to appreciate things that I can see even if it pours from above.
It’s at this moment that it started raining like crazy, the moment I stepped out on to the platform at Himeji to go back to Hiroshima. It seems that I have made the most of my window of opportunity to experience real beauty, and that window seemed to have shut very abruptly and very timely on me. It seems that the one in charge of the weather thought I deserved a bit of relief.
Tomorrow I have no plans really, although I have a couple of ideas: Either I go to Osaka, or I want to return to Nagasaki to see the things I missed. I’m currently leaning more towards Nagasaki though, I felt like that city really clicked with me, and besides, it doesn’t feel right to give such a large city as Osaka only one day. Maybe that will be for the next time I come to Japan. In any case, who knows what tomorrow will bring ? The least I hope for is dry weather.
Humanposting 