My son has worked in Iwakuni for just a year now. He started working there since 5 March 2016. We decided to pay him a visit. I wanted to see the place where he stays. So, we made the trip on from 7th to 9th April 2017.
We did not make any trip together since my father-in-law was bedridden. For that 15 years, we can only make separate, individual trip as one of us had to stay behind to take of him. After his demise on 12 March 2016, we took our first trip together a year later. We decided for our first trip to go and see our son working at Iwakuni.
The first day we arrived, it was already dark in the early evening. We went to see the famous Kintai Bridge. Even though my son's rental apartment has three rooms, we opt to stay at Green Rich Hotel. The hotel has a common bath area. This common bath with its burbling hot water gave some amount of comfort on my injured shoulder.
I had a fall at the end of February. It was a rainy day and the road was wet and slippery. I stepped on a grilled-covered manhole that must be slippery on a slope going down the hill. During the fall, I didn't feel any pain. Unfortunately, the banging pain on my shoulder and neck came about 10 days later when I must have exerted my body during a 1000 meter lap-swim. Anyway, the hot water pool helped to bring down the aching on my shoulder and neck. I used this common bath all through our stay at the hotel.
It was a weekend and my son took us to Itsukushima. There was a shrine that has received the World Heritage status on the island. Many deer were roaming on the shrine's ground. The ferry ride was only 10 minutes. It came at every 10 minutes interval and I noticed the ferry was loaded with foreign travellers. We took sea eel for lunch. That was the first time I took a whole lunch box of sea eel. Sea eel has a smoother and softer texture than the fresh-water eel. Sea eels don't smell swampy as well, unlike the fresh-water eels.
From Itsukushima Island, we took JR train to Hiroshima. My first trip to Hiroshima was years ago. We re-visited the Hiroshima Dome and Hiroshima Castle.
By the way, my novel Pagi Semerah Daun Momiji or The Morning Momiji told of the atomic bomb that was exploded on the morning of the historical day. I mentioned the Hiroshima Dome and it's surrounding when the bomb impacted the city and its aftermath.
I was a refreshing trip for us, at least we got to see how our son lives alone in that house.
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