Brenda Aprezza

The day began with our arrival at Hiroshima. Immediately, I was overwhelmed because of the history that accompanies this city. Upon arriving in Hiroshima, we visited the peace museum. The museum was filled with old artifacts and photos about the United States and the War.

However, what was most shocking was the old torn up clothing and artifacts that demonstrated how terrible the bombing of Hiroshima was. Each artifact and piece of clothing had its own story. What nearly got me into tears were the stories of young school children dying in the arms of their parents. Many children didn’t even have the opportunity to return home to their parents after the bombing. Some parents only found the clothing of their children, or a name tag, and that is how they knew that their child was no more. In the United States, when studying about the bombing of Hiroshima, we usually just skim over the events and pride ourselves in ending the war. However, one does not really take into consideration all the innocent casualties that had to die in order to do so. I never really thought about the young children or families who died during the Hiroshima bombing. I had always seen the bombing of Hiroshima as a step towards ending the war. However, after visiting the Peace museum I realized it was an unnecessary act that caused the lives of so many innocent people. Thus, I was glad to see the Peace Park. In which there were statues dedicated to those who lost their lives during the bombing of Hiroshima. I was overjoyed to see that those who died on that fateful day are still being remembered.

Later during the day, we had the opportunity to take a ferry onto Miyajima Island. Although it was raining, the visit the island was still quite fun. The tide was low so we had the opportunity to take an up close picture with the historical gate located on the island. Miyajima island is known as deer island, and after spending some time with some deer I could see why. We had the opportunity to pet and take pictures with some of the local deer that were just standing around on the roads. After an hour of walking in the rain, Sam and I decided to go to a local cat café. Inside the café, there was a woman sitting with three cats on her lap. Immediately, Sam was jealous because we just couldn’t seem to attract any of the cats to come and play with us. Luckily, one of the cats came our way and we played with him for a couple minutes, until he dropped my hot chocolate. The rest of my time was spent cleaning the mess the cat had left. Overall, this was extremely fun and I managed to learn more about the bombing of Hiroshima. Which made me sympathize with the Japanese people and their call for Peace.