Hiroshima Carp vs Yakult Swallows

If you've ever seen Mr Baseball, an older movie featuring Tom Selleck as a washed up Major Leaguer who tries to revive his career in Japan, you'll probably appreciate this next story.

I got tickets to the Hiroshima Carp vs Yakult Swallows game a few months ago via Japan Ball tickets.  The tickets were waiting for us upon checking into our hotel as promised.   We were really looking forward to this game and we could see around the city that there was a lot of local support for the Carp.

The game was fantastic - wacky, fun-filled, great fan interactions and a Hollywood ending to boot!   I've posted three videos below on different moments of the game, but really, I could have posted 3 hours of video.   MLB in North America is struggling with an aging fan base and apathetic interest at best.  They could really learn from the Japanese.  They've created a really family friendly atmosphere - organized cheers throughout, giveaways, mascots, bring your own food if you want (one guy had a Costco pizza in line!), cheap and diverse food options to buy, kids zones with playgrounds.... It was fantastic.

The quality of the baseball is also top notch and the game tonight was amazing.  First, here's one of the spontaneous cheers that broke out for the audience to use with the prize giveaway of the night... Red Carp umbrellas for everyone....

Next came the 7th inning blow up balloon' wave it in the air and let them fly in some weird, hilarious, atmospheric insemination ritual....

Last video... Bottom of the 10th, ballgame tied 1-1, and we get.... A WALKOFF, GAME WINNING HOME RUN!!!! Watch...

Day 11: Miyajima

We spent the day in Miyajima - an island not far from Hiroshima that is famous for it's "floating torrii" ( seen below).  We were surprised by how much there was to do there.  The island has a mountain, Mt. Misen, that could be climbed or transported near the top by cable car.

Though we were thinking walk, Beth's back was a little sore and we had other activities later on, so we didn't want to force a hike down the kids throats!  

When we got to the top of the cable car, we took a 30 minute hike to get to the summit observatory.  There we kicked back for a few minutes and took in the view.  It was breath taking, and not in a Seinfeld-way.  Japan really has a lot of natural beauty to offer that I don't think Beth and really appreciated when we lived here.

On the ferry back to the mainland, we realized we were fortunate to have left early... The hordes were just starting to ferry over to the island and it was closed to 2:30pm.  We trained it back to the hotel for a little chill time before our next "experience" - more on that in another post.

Here are the two clowns in the cable car!

VLOG: Live from Hiroshima

Day 10: Hiroshima

We had to say goodbye to Kyoto and to our nice spacious apartment.  We are batting 1.000 on AirBnB accommodations, though we only have two more on our itinerary.

We got to Kyoto station and transferred to Shin Osaka station to board our 3rd Shinkansen train... this time bound for the historic city of Hiroshima.

When we got to our hotel we were a couple of hours early for checkin so we ditched our bags and walked over to the Atomic Bomb memorial and museum.

What can I say - it was horrific.  It's everything you can imagine, but the biggest thing that struck me is that when the Americans dropped the bomb on Hiroshima on August 6th, 1945, basically nobody in the world knew that that weapon existed.  The explosion, the fires and radiation that followed, the black rain that followed that... there was simply no knowledge on the ground about what had happened, how they should treat people and what was safe to eat and drink.

The park the Japanese built to commemorate the devastation is beautiful.   We met dozens of school children on a trip from Osaka that were not shy about trying out their English.

After a little chill time (where I schooled Abby in the mechanics and customs of Sumo which we are seeing on Sunday and which is on TV now daily), we set out for dinner.

Hiroshima is relaxed like Osaka, yet much more modern (no building is over 70 years old....).  It sill has the great retail covered streets that Osaka made famous and the shops and restaurants (and people) are chok-a-blok as usual.

We had dinner in a somewhat famous, tourist oriented place called Okonomi-mura - a play on words between Okonomiyaki and Mura or "village".  The place has three floors and twenty some odd vendors making various forms of Okonomiyaki - a local specialty food that is also found all over Japan.  It's basically a pancake type of food made on a teppan grill - ours had egg noodles, cabbage, beef, bean sprouts, a crepe topping and yakisoba sauce... delicious! 

It's movie night so the girls are watching Mean Girls on Netflix... that would have been an appropriate title at times throughout the day.  The sniping at each other wore a little thin today, however, as usual we just needed a few moments of recharge time and they quickly became more like Thelma and Louise!

Hiroshima museum

Today my family and I went to this Hiroshima museum. I found the museum really interesting and sad. I found it very sad because I do not like to see all the children and adults get burned to death and get squished against the buildings that fell on them during the atomic bomb during World War Two. 

After we went to the museum there was a paper that I filled out that was against atomic bombs, so I was happy to sign that right out of the box. Next mummy and I went to a gift shop from the museum and we got a book about a girl who survived the atomic bomb and then got cancer 10 years later. Sorry I can't tell you what the name of the book is called because I forgot the name. It is something like s.... ....and the thousand paper cranes. 

Then we went to the park and got to sign a survey from these little Japanese kids. (10 times). No, but it was fun. Bye guys I miss you a lot 

Robin Tyndall 

Starbucks review: Japan

My dad and I have created a rating system for each Starbucks we go to in every country. We base it on Ambiance, Service, Food/Drink Qualtity, Cleanliness and Selection. Here are our Starbucks ratings for our first country: Japan. 

Ambiance: 4/5

Service: 4/5 

Food/Drink Quality: 4.5/5

Cleanliness: 5/5

Selection: 4/5 

My dinner dates