The Shrine Island

Itsukushima is located next to Hiroshima Bay in the Inland Sea of Japan. Popularly known as Miyajima this Island belongs to Hayashi Razan's Nihon Sankei. Nihon Sankei is the list of three most popular sightseeing places in Japan. Beside Miyajima there are the sandbar of Amanohashidate and the islands of Matsushima. The most beautiful building on Miyajima is the Itsukushima shrine.

 Build in 593 it was destroyed and rebuild many times. This shrine stays on pillars on the beach. By the daily moving of the water, it is on land in the morning and seems to swim over the see at the evening.

 A lot of people come there to watch the water slowly moving in the shrine.  

Most popular view of this island is the 16 meter high torii, which stays in the water 160 meter before the shrine. Till tree in the afternoon visitors can walk beneath the torii and make photos. It is a tradition to put a 5 Yen coin in the cracks in the wood or between the corals like looking polyp colonies which cover the underwater standing part of the gate and make a wish.

All main buildings of Itsukushima are connected by a 280 meter long corridor. There is also the oldest Noh-theater stage in the world. The shrine and the torii are listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site and are Japanese Nationals Treasures.

If you plan to visit Itsukushima you can take a ferry from Hiroshima or Miyajimaguchi. You should try oysters at one of the stands in the shopping area, this is the regional specialty. The typical souvenirs are the wooden rice spoons. Monkeys and deer move freely. You should watch out especially if you carry something eatable with you, deer might be seen in Shinto as a messenger of gods, but they often act aggressive while trying to snatch some food from tourists.

If you would have time you should visit the Mount Misen. Parts of it are still covered by primeval forest. By a ropeway you can reach a shrine were by the monk Kukai ignite fire burn already for more than thousand years.

We will never forget...

The building now known as the A-bomb Dome was designed by Czech architect Jan Letzel. Completed in April 1915, the Hiroshima Prefectural Commercial Exhibition Hall soon became a beloved Hiroshima landmark with its distinctive green dome.

While business functions included commercial research and consulting services and the display and sale of prefectural products, the hall was also used for art exhibitions, fairs, and cultural events.

Through the years, it took on new functions and was renamed the Hiroshima Prefectural Products Exhibition Hall, then the Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall. As the war intensified, however, the hall was taken over by the Chugoku-Shikoku Public Works Office of the Interior Ministry, the Hiroshima District Lumber Control Corporation, and other government agencies.

Because the blast struck from almost directly above, some of the center walls remained standing, leaving enough of the building and iron frame to be recognizable as a dome.

After the war, these dramatic remains came to be known as the A-bomb Dome.

For many years, public opinions about the dome remained divided. Some felt it should be preserved as a memorial to the bombing, while others thought it should be destroyed as a dangerously dilapidated structure evoking painful memories.

As the city was rebuild and other A-bombed buildings vanished, the voices calling for preservation gathered strength. In 1966, the Hiroshima City Council passed a resolution to preserve the A-dome Dome, which led to a public fundraising campaign to finance the construction work. Donations poured in which wishes for peace from around Japan and overseas, making the first preservation project possible in 1967.

Several preservation projects have been carried out to ensure that the dome will always look as it did immediately after the bombing.

In December 1996, the A-bomb Dome was registered on the World Heritage List as a historical witness conveying the horror of the first use of a nuclear weapon, ans as a world peace monument appealing continually for lasting peace and the abolition of such weapons.

To help protect the dome, the national government designated the area around it as a historic site under the Cultural Properties Protection Act, with a larger area in and around Peace Memorial Park set aside as a buffer zone.