Memorial Monument The day we had Iwakuni town on our program, it was rainy. Actually it rained almost everyday during the tour from time to time but we were never stopped by it. And we owed it to our hosts, mostly to our driver who made sure that everyone gets one of the pink umbrellas that he kept in the bus for his guests. If we left without them and it started raining when we were at sightseeing, the hosts of the place we were visiting provided us with another set of pink umbrellas. One of them accompanied us all the way back to the bus and took the umbrellas back when she or he made sure that we were back in the bus all safe and dry! This gives me an idea about the level of hospitality in a country!
Lunch on boat We had a lunch scheduled on the Nishiki River by the Kintai-kyo or the "brocade sash bridge", one of the three most beautiful bridges of Japan along with the Rainbow Bridge and the Yokohama Bay Bridge. Our lunch would be on a wooden boat. Our hosts covered the boat with plastic, which would protect us from the pouring rain but still would let us see the beautiful view of the bridge, which was a modern replica. The original 17th century bridge was destroyed by a typhoon in 1953. While we were enjoying our boxed lunch cuddled in our warm blankets on the boat, a local guide provided all the background information on the mechanics and history of the bridge.
Kintai-kyo, Iwakuni Later during that day, we would see another bridge, Aioi, in Hiroshima City where the first atomic bomb was dropped on August 6th, 1945. It was amazing to see how the "City of Peace" recovered from all that suffering. If we didn't see the Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall, or A-Bomb Dome, which is the only building left untouched after the bomb hit Hiroshima, it would be really difficult to imagine what kind of a disaster the bomb created. Visiting the monuments in the Peace Memorial Park was a very difficult experience only to make one wish for "peace on earth" more if that's at all possible.
A-Bomb Dome and the Writer Ozgun Tasdemir (Japan Travel Specialist) Operations Manager Tourcom Int'l. Inc.
