The Great Dopamine Rush of 2025

Today started with a nice buffet breakfast in the hotel. Hannah and myself were both excited to go visit the Peace Memorial and the Peace Museum to learn more about the Hiroshima tragedy of Aug 6th 1945. After breakfast we walked down peace boulevard to the memorial park.

Now we thought we were prepared for it, We were both sadly mistaken. The museum was far beyond our expectations, in its ability to graphicly explain and portray the sheer extent of the atrocity that occurred here in Hiroshima. The number of innocent dead and how they died was a lot to take in at the museum. I learned about this in school when I was younger, but not face to face with bloody ripped and tattered clothes. Carbonized food in a child’s lunch box and photos of charred and burnt bodies. It was a lot, Both Hannah and myself shed some tears in the museum.

We walked around the rest of the memorial park for a few hours, visiting the thousands of paper cranes at the memorial, and the A-bomb Dome. Which is the last standing reminder of the devastation of that day. There was a lot of emotions today. Especially when the reality that 75 years ago exactly where we ate ramen yesterday, was the hypocenter of a 15 Kilo Ton nuclear explosion instantly vaporized or burned 75,000 people and wiped 14 sq kilometers of Hiroshima off the face of the earth.

From the memorial we went to go find some sushi for lunch. Now you cant always win when your playing restaurant roulette, our lunch sucked. From there we walked to a nearby massage parlor, Hannah got a well deserved massage. While she was getting a rub down, I went to a nearby Pachinko parlor. I am not much for gambling, but I’ve always wanted to try Pachinko. I understand how people get addicted to it, It was fun. An hour disappeared very quickly. I spent $50 after I collected my winnings so all in all not a bad way to spend an hour. We went back to the hotel for a quick change, and then we went to the restored Hiroshima castle. What a cool experience that was. There was so much history there.

From the castle we found a tiny hole in the wall udon restaurant, on the route back to the hotel. Hannah has had great luck picking restaurants, and our meal was incredible. On top of being delicious, it was only $20 for the two of us to leave satisfied. I ordered the suggested special from the chef, not realizing that it was a whole katsu donburi and a bowl of udon. Thankfully Hannah loves noodles and helped me finish it.

On our walk back to the hotel, we stopped and grabbed some pastries and a bottle of champagne for dessert. Sadly the champagne was not that great, but the pastry was good. I am going to miss finishing the night with pastries and champagne. Hannah was asleep by 9pm. Tomorrow we head back to Tokyo to do our last leg of the trip.

Till tomorrow.