I Ate Vegetables. And Intestine.

Miranda Guppy '20
Mar 16, 2017
2 min read

Today we traveled from Tokyo to Hiroshima by bullet train, Shinkansen in Japanese. I wish I could say it was interesting and exciting. I can't though.

We started the day early (not actually), and desperately packed the bags we should have packed the night previous in the short hour given to us after eating breakfast. Though some of us did pack (surprisingly enough) the night before and as it turns out I was not one of those people.

After arriving at the station that we would use to board the Shinkansen, we browsed around a food court, for a lack of better words, to find some food items and snacks for lunch on the train. I unfortunately spent most of my time trying to decide what was alcohol and what was actually water at the small local convenience store while hauling around my luggage and trying not to knock everything off of the shelves.

When we boarded the first bullet train, finally, we were pleased to discover that our seats were ones that could revolve, and we happily rotated our chairs so we could face one another as we played cards, except I did not play cards. The first bullet train took about three hours, and we were lucky enough to see Mount Fuji! Actually, we only saw half of the mountain. Just the bottom part. The top was covered with a wall of clouds so big we couldn't even see the tip. The first bullet train was named the Hikari and the second was Sakura. These names were supposed to represent the theme of the trains decor in one way or another, Hikari meaning ray of light or lightning, and Sakura being related to spring and cherry blossoms. There was lots of wood and earthy tones on the train's interior, while the Hikari bullet train was more clean and chic.

When we Arrived in Hiroshima, we went straight to the hotel and then out to dinner. We ate Okonomiyaki, which kind of translates to "everything that you like grilled" quoted by out chaperones. It was really good and we got to scrape it off the grill and add our own sauces on top. And what was even better were the appetizers. Things like the necks of chicken, pork cheeks, and intestine. I liked the cheeks the most. We don't know what kind of animal the intestine belonged to, though.

After dinner, we went off and did our own thing for about a half an hour, and while us girls went to a local book store where I bought a novel that I will probably never read and just because I wanted to. The boys went off and did their own thing at a shop that sold everything anime related.

And that was our day, for better or worse.

Hikari shinkansen ride.