JttE Nagasaki

Bike reassembly first then onto a “Rest day”.

Pete Seeger’s “Where have all the flowers gone?”, came to mind. “When will we ever learn, when will we ever learn?” The lessons of history are there for all to see, and fail to heed.

Perhaps the horrors of the two atomic bombs dropped on Japan have been heeded. Nuclear proliferation yes, use no: but the difference between peace and obliterarion is waver thin. And in the hands of a very few compared to those who pay the price.

The museum didn’t major on the whys or the differences in opinions about the bomb’s deployment, nor Japan’s undisputed war atrocities. Rather a powerful focus on the effect on people and place. The stats are too many to absorb. The pictures and debris tell the story. I do hope we heed.

The peace park is a place for contemplation: the hypo centre where the bomb exploded 500m above is a place where the scale of the nuclear wind casts its shadow.

We got there and back on the excellent tram system. 75p per journey. Why we dismantled ours I never know. Not too many westerners on them – most use taxis.

Coming back to the docks where Nagasaki developed from it’s a short walk to the former European centre. It’s based around Grover Park. Thomas Blake Grover was a Scottish trader who did much to open up and develop trade links and Japan in the 19C.

An initial memory is of small box like cars buzzing around narrow lanes. Hair of different colours than Korea’s black. More diverse. Still very clean, litter and graffitti free. Lower buildings. Polite.