Flea Market or Bust

Inside of the Cable Car
Izac and I on the Train
Comfortable train seats (NOT like the DC Metro OH and you can eat or drink on the train and not get arrested)
This was our map. You may not be able to tell but the thing is in Japanese.



So today Izac and I decided to go to a Flea Market in Hiroshima. It is called the Niji Hiroba Flea market. I believe it means Rainbow Plaza or Rainbow Square. Anyways Izac decided sometime this week he wanted to go so he asked me to go to ITT (Information Tours and Travels ) and get information on how to get from the base to this flea market. The wonderful lady not only got me the train schedule in English with all the stops ready but she also gave us a map that had our route set up for us. I found out that to get to where we wanted to go we had to take a local train and then take a street car. The ITT lady also gave me the cost for each form of transportation so I could go to Izac and say we need this much yen to go one way etc.

This morning we had a late start because yours truly had to call her old job and iron out some pay issues late the previous night. We left our home and went to the Crossroads. It is kinda the foot court of the base (some call it Fatroads). This is the area that local Taxis are available.

Before we left Izac suggested we look for a book that might have phrases because although I had suggested we right some phrases down (found on the Internet) neither of us was completely sure how to correctly pronounce them. We were successful in finding a book that gave the phonetic pronunciation of words/phrases (very helpful with a speech pathologist who can read phonetics). We then proceeded to the Taxi and then to the local train station.

Once there we stared at a bank of 4 ticket machines, and a booth with a man it it. I understood enough to know that the man was selling Shinkansen tickets (bullet train)and that was not what we needed. We watched 3 or 4 people purchase tickets and then with trepidation we stepped up to a machine. After staring we looked to the right and saw this 8.5 X 11 piece of paper describing how difficult it was for Americans/English speakers to buy tickets. Thankfully Izac spotted a machine that had some English on it. We also had our handy dandy map that had the symbols that represent Hiroshima so we knew witch button to push for that city. Yours truly figured out how to get it to do tickets for 2 people at the same time while Izac figured out how to do round trip tickets. The question that you might be asking yourself is How many Americans does it take to buy train tickets to Hiroshima? The answer is 2.

We figured out how to put our raffle ticket size train ticket into the machine that punched it. (Mind you this was after we compared the symbols and arrows to make sure that we had the correct ticket for this particular portion of the ride). We then stared at more boards that thankfully were electronic and flashed from Japanese to English. This allowed us to figure out that we had to go from track 1 where we were to track 4.

All of this was in some pretty cold windy conditions so when we arrived at our train I was happy. We sat down in some very comfortable seats and settled in for our ride. It was a fairly straight forward ride and we arrived in Hiroshima with no trouble. Once there we followed a wave of humanity up one flight of stairs and then down another and out into the city.

From the exit of the train station Izac and I saw the street car we needed to take so we fastwalked over to it and hopped on. I was a little worried because we got in at the door that said exit but other people were doing so as well. Often in America you pay as you get on to transportation. We were not sure when to put in our yen but again decided to observe the locals. It turns out you pay as you leave.

We took our 30 min cable car ride and got off at the stop that was at the flea market. Now keep in mind this market is supposed to have about 150 vendors. When we arrived there were about 8. The add for the market claims that there are antiques, clothes, crafts, etc. It was just junk. We got there and I said "It looks like a yard sale". SO Niji Hiroba Flea Market is a bust.

We left the market and got back on the cable car. The weather was getting pretty ugly so we decided to head back to Iwakuni. BUT before we got back on the train we needed to find the facilities. Izac has a knack for finding bathrooms so I just follow him.

Once we got back to the train station we got coffee out of a vending machine and warmed our hands at the same time. It was pretty good coffee. We boarded a train and headed back to Iwakuni.

Once we arrived we got off the train and decided to go find something to eat. On our way we stopped at a store alot like our drug stores in America (i found my Aosept solution). We had no luck finding something to eat as a number of the restaurants close between lunch and dinner (at that point it was 2) so we decided to head back to a bakery that we had seen. On our way I saw the 100 yen store that I had been to previously. I enthusiastically dragged Izac into the store where we proceeded to buy numerous items (see a later posting). After that we went to the bakery and bought some fresh baked goods.

At this point it was 4:00 and we were both tired. We hailed a cab and went back to base. All in all a good day. Next week we have another flea market in a different part of Hiroshima to try to find. Stay tuned to find out if we are successful.