Kobe: Nov. 16-17, 2019

I visited to Kobe to attend a conference. I spent some time during my stay to walk around the city.

Kobe locates between the Rokko mountains in the north and the Seto Inland Sea in the south. The population is about 1.5 million.

I watched the landscape of the city in the daytime from the observatory in the City Hall tower. The top photo is a view of the city with the Rokko Mountains in its back.

The left photo is a view of the sea area.

The City Hall is 132 meter high. The observatory is at about 100 meter in the 24th floor.

The landscape in the night was beautiful. I enjoyed it from Kobe University, which locates on a hillside of the Rokko mountains.

Sannomiya is the busiest area in the city. There are railway stations of JR, private railway Hankyu and Hanshin, as well as subway in the area.

Modern shopping malls were crowded with people.

There spreads a China town in Motomachi area, west from Sannomiya. (See also the 3rd photo)

Kobe Port is one of the largest ports in Japan. It has long history. I found people enjoying a beautiful day in a park near the port.

There are many western-style houses at the foot of the Rokko Mountains. There houses were built by the Europeans and Americans in the Meiji era. The came to Japan to engage in trade business; the Meiji government allocated some places for them to stay.

The old houses are now popular tourist spots. (See also the 2nd photo from the top) 

I found many foreign tourists, especially Chinese tourists, enjoying sightseeing in the area.

I also visited Ikuta Shrine, one of Kobe's oldest shrines. Many families were there to pray a good fortune for their kids. Japan has a kids festival in the middle of November.

Kobe was seriously hit by the Great Hanshin Earthquake in 1995. Many buildings, houses, roads, railroads ports and highways were destroyed. Thousands of people were killed.

I visited Disaster Reduction and Human Renovation Institute, a museum where the records of the earthquake are displayed. The institute also shows recent developments on disaster reduction and other quake-related topics.

A 360 degree-wide panorama movie showed us the impacts of the quake. Other displays taught us how widely and deeply the earthquake hit the area.

There were groups of Japanese high-school students and foreign tourists in the institute. Everyone watched the displays seriously.

25 years passed since the Earthquake day. The destroyed towns, such as Sannomiya, were rebuilt. Still, people live with the memory of the disaster – it is the impression I received when I was talking with local prople.