A Weekend in Oshima and Hiroshima
This just past weekend we took a small excursion south via high speed rail. We headed out of Tokyo on Friday to visit Winnie's cousin Amy who teaches English on a small island called Oshima. On the way back up we visited Hiroshima for a few hours.
Oshima is a sleepy farming and fishing town. It's populated mostly by retirees looking for a more laid back place to call home with a nice island view. Transportation is also all by car. In other words, it's about as different as you can possibly find from the hustle and bustle of Tokyo. It made a great break. To save time writing, here's another bullet list of some highlights:
- We finally played pachinko. This was also the first time that Amy played! We lost all of the money we intended to play with after only a few minutes. It's only marginally more entertaining than slot machines in Vegas.
- Amy drove us around touring her island. The views were great.
- We ate at a local tourist trap called the mountain bandit restaurant. They had good chicken on a stick.
- Went shopping at a nearby city and bought all sorts of stuff from the Mr. Max (a big box store). We also inspected the pets they had available: from a wild chipmunk that appeared to be going crazy to $150 dung beetles that only live a few months.
- I found some Fugu, a local specialty, at the supermarket and ate it. I did not die.
- Very yummy sushi converyer belt for dinner on Saturday.
- Amy took us to her favorite Jamacan Rastaraunt that serves food from a truck and procides dining in a bamboo shack on top of a cliff.
Amy joined us for the short detour to Hiroshima on the way back to Tokyo. Here's another bulleted list.
- We saw peace park and the atomic bomb dome. We took many photos, including one taken by a Japanese tourist with all three of us. He asked us to smile for the photo, but smiling with the dome in the background somehow seemed inappropriate.
- We shopped more! I'm still unable to find any engrish tee shirts, but I found some other interesting ones.
- We ate another local specalty: okonomiyaki
That's all! Time for another day of fun before it rains.