After a hearty breakfast we set off in fine weather for Kure, near Hiroshima city, to visit the Yamato museum (Museum of Japanese Maritime History). We began by receiving a highly informative presentation about the famous battleship Yamato, built right here in Kure (which was longer than the entirety of Otsuma Nakano’s school building site!). The museum itself contains a number of huge and beautiful models of battleships, and a lot of maritime artifacts, as well as the full fascinating maritime history of Japan. The students also had fun in the technology room, playing with various experiments and demonstrations of naval technology. We were then treated to a curry-rice lunch, cooked to an authentic naval recipe, in the grand surroundings of the Clayton Bay Hotel. After lunch we returned to Hiroshima city and resumed yesterday’s tour of the peace park and A-bomb historical sites, with our expert guides leading the way and informing us about the history of each site.

We finished our tour with a visit to The Peace Memorial Museum. This is naturally a very upsetting but necessary place for any Japanese student to visit, and the students, in common with, all visitors to this place, took a serious and reflective approach to it’s exhibits. We returned to the hotel for a well-earned dinner and a rest. Our after-dinner activity was a reflective study time. The students thought, shared, and wrote of their thoughts and conclusions of the day’s experiences, and tried in earnest to absorb the difficult, painful, and important lessons of Hiroshima.

２日目の朝。今日も快晴で、ホテルから見える海の景色は絶景でした。

午前中は、呉にある「大和ミュージアム」「てつのくじら館」を見学しました。戦艦大和や魚雷などの模型を見たり、潜水艦の中の生活を体験したりしました。大和の大きさは、大妻中野の校舎とグラウンドを足したものより大きかったですね！

午後は、きのうに引き続き、平和記念公園周辺をガイドさんの案内でまわりました。グループごとに、袋町小や旧日本銀行広島支店などの被爆地も見学しました。

今日最後の見学地は、平和記念資料館です。当時の状況を生々しく伝える、写真、絵、言葉の数々。思わず目を背けたくなるような、筆舌に尽くしがたい当時の状況に、声も出ません。それでも、この事実を後世に伝えることが、残された私たちがすべきことなのでしょう。

夜。ホテルにて、振り返り活動を行いました。グループで情報を共有し、しおりにまとめていきます。次は、皆さんが発信する番ですね。