Famished, he soon headed immediately back toward the port to a restaurant that had a sign posted, serving the local specialty: mussels. He had in his broken Japanese meanwhile asked around for an inexpensive place to eat and residents all pointed him back to that same location. There was a curfew at the hostel, so he hurried up, sat down, and ordered a fine local meal at the large family restaurant.
Kansas continued, "I hadn't stopped to eat all day. I was famished! So, at 8:30pm I found myself at an Izakaya, ordering two small meals, including a side-order of local scallops and a beer. As I was eating, I began to write in my journal. Suddenly, a haggard man in his 50s and wearing a nice suit motioned to me to take a seat across from me."
Kansas added, "I should note that in Japan it is not uncommon at-all for total-strangers to sit down at a table to eat together. I suppose that is because it is a very highly-populated land, and personal-space for eating is very small and thus often shared in public spaces. I ordered a second beer as the tired man sitting across from me drank his beer along with his meal. As we drank together, he introduced himself as Mr. Yamanaka. At first he spoke to me a little in his broken English, but when he discovered that I was teaching in public schools in Japan as an assistant English teacher (AET), he began to mix in a lot of Japanese to his conversation."
Kansas explained, "It turned out that he, Mr. Yamanaka, was a newly appointed kocho-sensei. That is, he was the new school principle at a local elementary school, where he had already worked in as vice-principle for several years. I congratulated him on his recent promotion and offered him some beer, too. Yamanaka-san told me then that he had once traveled to America to visit and observe schools in Indiana and California with colleagues of his from here in Japan. He then asked me how my day in Hiroshima had been. His next question was whether I had gone to see the Peace Park and the Genbakudon-that is, the Hiroshima Dome?"
"Since I had just jotted it down in my diary some of my day's events, I turned to my diary and recited the whole lists of things I had done along with the feelings I had experienced that day-including the activities on Miyajima island as well as those events and thoughts I had had earlier at the Hiroshima Peace Park. Yamanaka-san then inquired whether I would like to drink some sake, Japanese rice-wine, with him."
"I indicated that I would." Kansas continued.
"Later, Yamanaka-san looked thoughtfully at his watch and asked me whether I had enough time to go home with him for about an hour before my youth hostel closed for the night. Yamanaka-san said he would love to introduce me to his family. I told him the exact time the curfew at the hostel would begin, and I asked him how we could get to his house. Mr. Yamanaka stated that by taxi his home was only about six or seven minutes away. So, within minutes, and still feeling a bit high from the alcohol, we were being whisked through the streets by taxi further a higher up the hills above Miyajima Town--and away from the harbor and away from the youth hostel. I marveled at my host-to-be's hospitality."
"At the genkan of his abode, I politely took my shoes off as is custom in Japan, just as Yamanaka-san shouted Tadaima or 'I am home'. The new kocho-sensei then turned to me and explained to his wife how he had come to have a surprise-guest that night. Next, Yamanaka-san shouted for both his father and his son, who happened to be home from college on spring break, to come and sit down with me. Within seconds, we were in the family daidokoro-kitchen-and seated at the table. We drank more sake and chatted excitedly."
"Yamanaka's ojii-san nodded to me with a big half-toothless smile. He was very short, chubby, and with long white hair. This ojii-san must have been in his eighties and at that moment appeared to be the most-overtly-excited individual in the room. Slowly, ojii-san began to ask me several relatively simple questions in Japanese."
"Suddenly, another elderly person entered the kitchen. This turned out to be ojii-san's wife. The tiny ancient lady sat beside her husband and spoke much more quietly than her energetic husband. Then, just as his own son had done earlier to me in the restaurant bar, Yamanaka's ojii-san asked me what I had been up to all that day. I then proceeded to tell some of the same tales about Hiroshima and Miyajima which I had shared with Yamanak-san approximately a half-hour earlier. Then, with the blessing of alcohol hanging over all of us, I boldly asked whether ojii-san had witnessed the genbakudon or the atomic explosion."
"Yamanaka's ojii-san shook his head. 'No' he replied and then winked in the direction of his wife. He explained that he had been assigned by the Japanese railroad commission to spend the duration of the war in China running the railroads during the occupation there. Then, with a chuckle that caught me off-guard, ojii-san added, however, that his own wife, whom he called Obaa-chan, had lived in Hiroshima at the time though -only a few kilometers from the epicenter of the blast at Ground Zero. He added that is why he called Obaa-chan, his little wife: 'genbaku-chan'. Chan is the diminutive form of san in Japanese, so he was jokingly calling his wife "my little atomic bomb girl".
"My mouth dropped." shared Kansas.
"I could hardly believe how special this encounter was turning out to be. However, as I tried to communicate with these two octogenarians in Japanese I struggled ever-so-much-even as the son and grandson offered to try and help me comprehend and translate what these octogenarians were telling me. Finally, I formulated one question, which my curiosity led me to ask, 'Do any members of your family suffer from bomb related diseases, like Leukemia?'"
"All three generations of the family shook their heads, 'No.'"
"My mouth dropped again in amazement that the Evil of the Bomb had passed over all three generations of Hiroshima District residents." Kansas added.
Kansas continued stuttering, "You mean that all generations of your family who have lived here in Hiroshima are sitting in front of me and none of you are suffering any related illnesses?"
