Writing Exercise 066

My dear writing buddy Sam from the Dead Pete Society is responsible for this week's writing exercise. She posted a prompt, and I instantly took it and did with it what you are about to read. You will see, this little story is greatly influenced by one of our day trips while we were in Japan.
So here goes:

 

2017/03/16 – "They thought I would forget. But I remembered. Everything."

Sitting in a rocking chair on the porch she enjoyed the soothing warmth of the late summer sun, sipping on some iced tea and fanning herself with yesterday's newspaper with her good hand. The old radio beside her on the small table played a happy tune. The grass had turned brown due to the lack of rain and the leaves stirred in the light breeze. She peered at the cloudless sky as the weather forecast promised a summer rain in the evening.

The afterthought of a smile faded in the many wrinkles around her mouth. Rain. She remembered the feel of the rain on her skin; even decades later she saw every tiny detail before her mind's eye. Her life had changed so much, but still the image, the noises and smells of this one incident were so very vivid as if engraved in stone or captured in a black and white photo or family stories told for generations.

But photos turned so easily to ashes when set aflame, stone crumbled to rubble in the face of a destructive force beyond comparison, generations of people were winked out in a single blinding flash that made earth the embodiment of hell. Distinctive clouds heralding nothing but death in their wake, an explosion with a destructive force never seen before, the stench of charred black flesh, fatal damage done on a cellular level, a whole city of buildings blasted to dust, the wails of agony of those who survived the blast. And hours later came the rain – the black rain.

She had been but a child back then, innocent, never understood what hit her when it did. She lost everything on that day – everything but her raw life. Surprisingly she had sustained the mother of all explosions, the black rain, the long-term aftermath of radiation, and she continued to do so.

But she would always walk the Earth with her eyes turned skyward, her mind tuned to the many gods in the hope one might hear her prayers for peace to remain and the black rain to stay away. For, even if younger generations became oblivious to the inhumanity and destructive force of war, she still remembered. Everything.

I'm back! :D

Finally I returned from my holidays in Japan.
It was just amazing and I have so much to tell and show you.

We stayed mostly in Osaka and did day trips from there to Kyoto, Nara and Kobe, then rode the Shinkansen to Hiroshima and spent the last three days in Tokyo.
Here are a few impressions:

This is Osaka castle, which we visited on February 27th. It was rebuilt after WW2, as it was destroyed back then. Now, inside there is a museum, and from the top you have very pretty views over Osaka.

Here you can see the beautiful view over Osaka from the Sky Building. I'm afraid, the photo doesn't show the extent of how breathtaking the sundown was, as the sun slowly disappeared behind the mountains.

In Kyoto we saw a lot of shrines and temples. The city is really beautiful with its old wooden houses and people actually wearing kimonos. Here you can see the Senbon Dorii (10,000 gates) route starting at the Fujimi Inari Shrine, which goes up to the mountain top and back. And yes, we went all the way! @.@

This is the harbour of Kobe, where we went on March 2nd. In Kobe we visited the Desaster Reduction and Human Renovation Institute, where they research earthquakes and tsunamis and what can be done when one of them strikes. We did not eat Kobe beef, but had very delicious curry. :D

In Nara there are deer everywhere, at the temples and shrines, at the bus stop, in the park, on the streets... As they are very tame, you can feed and pet them. Isn't that amazing? Though I kept thinking how delicious venison is. XD

Hiroshima was both sad and impresive to visit. This is the only building that somewhat survived the a-bomb. We have been to the peace museum, where they exhibited everything related to the incident from torn and tattered clothes to pictures of severely burnt and mutilated people. But there are brighter sides to Hiroshima, too...

This is Miyajima island, which is close to Hiroshima. In the centre of the photo you can see the famous Torii and parts of the temple to which it belongs. When it's high tide the temple is awash. There are also a few tame deer there. I wonder how they got on that island? o.O

Finally, we arrived in Tokyo on March 6th. Here we are in Akihabara, which is loud and colourful and bustling with people. This is pretty much how you'd imagine the capital, right? But this is but a part of it.

Even in Tokyo there are temples, shrines and pagodas like this one everywhere. And deep in the surprisingly green heart of Ueno park, we found this:

The first cherry blossoms!