Tuesday 8th April Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum and Park.

 Our hotel is part of a vast station and shopping complex, which we have to navigate again this morning to get on the coach which will take us the short distance to the Memorial Peace Museum. The city of Hiroshima is of course very modern, having been rebuilt completely after the devastation of WW2, and it is a bustling and prosperous looking area today, with wide tree lined avenues and high end shops.

I think we all are feeling a little apprehensive today, as having grown up in the 1960's when the threat of nuclear war was always a possibility, we all know the history of the dropping of the atom bomb on the towns of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the horrific consequences.

It's another beautiful sunny day as we make our way through the wide highway and modern buildings, arriving at the large, low rise museum in front of the broad parkland.

On entering, we follow a long low lit corridor, which leads us to a large circular exhibit that we look down on, on the floor, a huge photographic map of the city of Hiroshima from above, as it was before the blast. As we stand taking in some of the landmarks, the view changes slowly to the same view of the city, but this time, as it was in the aftermath of the atomic blast. Nearly every building has been destroyed - here is a description -

Within a radius of roughly two kilometers (about 1.2 miles) from the hypocenter, almost everything in Hiroshima was destroyed or severely damaged, with wooden buildings suffering major damage even further out. Here's a more detailed breakdown:

• Within 2 kilometers:

  Nearly all buildings were destroyed or burned, with the blast pressure reaching 19 tons per square meter even 500 meters from the hypocenter. 
• Beyond 2 kilometers:

  Wooden buildings still sustained major damage, and 90% of structures in the city experienced devastating damage. 

The route around the museum then takes us into several more area where the stories and photographs become more personal, with photographs and detailed descriptions of the inhabitants. It is extremely graphic, seeing the faces, some of the clothes the people were wearing and reading their stories. We all move around slowly and in complete silence; I think we all feel that although some of the exhibits are extremely difficult to look at, it's something we must all do, to honour their memory.

As if the horror of the initial blast wasn't enough, those who manage to survive it suffer terrible burns; not only that, but the long term effects of the 'black rain' that falls, leading to severe illness in the coming years and birth defects in their children, are all laid out in graphic detail in front of us as we move slowly through.

Nearing the end of the exhibits, the mood does lighten and we move out of the dimly lit areas into a much brighter space where we can read about the more positive stories of those who survived and the way the citizens did all they could to help each other and begin to rebuild their lives. Despite the horrors of that time, we do read of some who survived and lived to old age, which seems incredible  in view of what they lived through.

The views from the museum building we have now are of the beautiful and colourful Peace Park that surrounds the museum and we are grateful to walk out into the bright sunshine.