fun stuff

Rain, rain and more rain. Enough to bring the trains across the country to a halt - so much for my view of the invincibly efficient JR network. The rain had already put my Miyajima plans in doubt and the news of train troubles made up my mind - I settled for a day pottering round Hiroshima. It's a very potterable city, small enough for all the sights to be within easy walking distance. Mostly I just strolled, stopped for lunch, and strolled some more. Tried the local speciality - okonomiyaki - something like a thin layer of pancake piled high with cabbage, noodles, meat, sauce, drizzled with more batter then flipped over onto an awaiting wafer-thin omelette. This huge creation was pushed across the hotplate towards where I perched and proceeded to chop large lumps of the delicious mass onto my plate. All accomplished with sign-language and prepared with gusto by a tiny old lady who never stopped smiling.

My wanderings took my into the supposedly hardware shop, Tokyu Hands, where I had a wonderful time wondering what on earth things were. This shop is amazing, it has everything you never knew you needed, from household items to puzzling gadgetry, wrap-around bicycle lights, 100 different kinds of magnifying glasses, fancy dress and typical joke-shop items, puzzles, shoe-driers, slip-on umbrella handle covers, clips for milk cartons... I've never had so much fun browsing a shop. In a department store I found a whole section given over to things made from microfibre tumble-twist bathmats (and bathmats themselves), the hands down winner being the floor-mopping slipper bootees. Very tempted to try shuffling round my flat in a pair of those in an attempt to clean the floor. Oh and the tumble-twist lined umbrella bag... that was another good one. Anyway, I managed to come away empty handed, not even as much as a plastic prawn key-ring - quite an achievement!