When I visited in 2007, Hiroshima struck me as the most "Canadian" of Japanese cities I saw. It's core is criss-crossed by five rivers, and they are bordered by walkways and cafes rather than overhung with expressways as was the case in Osaka and Tokyo. Not so vulgar or loud, everything in Hiroshima struck me as rather restrained. Perhaps its unique history lends the city a more formal, less commercial flavour.
Though the Peace Memorial Museum does an admirable job of telling the story of the day the A-Bomb fell on the city, I was often more struck by the plaques around the city which described events as they unfolded nearby. In the Shukkeien Garden, the injured flocked there hoping to get medical attention, and they mostly died. In an office building, all the workers were killed by flying glass and steel from window-frames. On a bridge, people jumped into the water below to ease their suffering, and drowned. The plaques hold photos from the months after the bomb, and they act as a constant reminder of a city's destruction.
Photo List (Total 88 Photos)
Click bolded headers below to view, or click "just the best" for quick tour
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Peace (18 photos) - Not surprisingly, a large part of central Hiroshima is given over to monuments and museums promoting the cause of peace, and of remembrance of the atom bomb. A surprise for me was that so much of the central city was built in the 1960's, so for a fan of that era, Hiroshima offers a cornucopia of delights.
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City photos (57 photos) - Includes river views, various museums and other buildings, photos of the Hiroshima Castle, various statues and public art, and the exquisite Shukkeien Garden (my favourite Japanese garden).
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Transit Photos (13 photos) - Subway pics, and a single photo containing a collage of different streetcar shots from Hiroshima. I also included here some photos taken from across Japan from the window of the train is it went by, including some pics of Japanese suburbia, central Nagano, and various other scenes.
