A Night in Hiroshima

There are a lot of things that I could say about Hiroshima. I will keep it brief: Hiroshima completely rebuilt itself in the years after the A-bomb, and as a result, the city looks like a late-20th century version of a mid-sized, American city. Bars, restaurants, hotels, stores, mid-rise apartment buildings... What was astounding was to know that our hotel was maybe 500 yards from the epicenter of the blast and save for the Peace Park and memorials, the few remaining buildings, and the museums about the war, you couldn't really discern that an A-bomb wiped Hiroshima flat less than 100 years ago if you just took a quick look around.

Before we seriously visited the park, the museum, and the memorials, we had the evening to explore the town. Hiroshima is now known for its nightlife and party scene (in addition to its past), so we ventured out to try some local fare (okonomiyaki) and find a good watering hole.

Okonomiyaki is best described as a sort of multi-layered pancake cooked on a griddle in front of you. It's delicious, savory, cheap, and best of all, it combines seafood, noodles, and veggies in one fell swoop. They push it towards you when it's cooked, and you use a spatula-thing to cut out portions to go on your plate. Then you grab your chopsticks and go to town.

From dinner we ventured out to a few places listed in my Lonely Planet guidebook, and through the earnest inquiries of our new friend, Rob, we found a gem of a bar called Mac Bar. Mac, the proprietor, is best described as a 60-something Japanese hippie. He also has a dive bar in the basement of some building with a zillion cds that he plays upon request and with delight. Around 1am, Mac broke out his acoustic guitar and serenaded us with a little Bob Dylan. It turned out to be a kind of ex-pat bar, and we ran into some Swedes, some Canadians, and some Brits while we were there.

So, we celebrated the Hiroshima of the present on our first night in the city knowing that in the morning, we'd have a pretty heavy, intense look at the effects of war on the Hiroshima of the past.