Okinawa, Japan
My second trip to Japan was to the island of Okinawa. I didn't know much about it, except that there is a lot of American military bases here, and they maybe had some nice beaches. Okinawa was the site of the last land battle of World War II, and this event forms a significant part of it's history.
Okinawa is very different than Tokyo, that's for sure. It reminded me of Malaysia and Thailand. Most of the city was pretty bland-looking, although there were exceptions.
We visited a lot of museums which dealt with the Battle of Okinawa. This was the Imperial Japanese Navy Underground Headquarters, which was a bunch of caves dug into a hill.
The caves aren't carved from rock, but are actually dug into hard-packed dirt. There is plaster walls and supporting beams to help support the caves.
The commander's room...
Many of the soldiers committed suicide rather than be taken prisoner.
We also visited the Okinawa Prefectural Peace Memorial Museum. The various museums cover a lot of the same information, but what was interesting here is that it also covered the post-war history of okinawa.
There is a park next to the museum.
There are many of these memorials with the names of the dead - Japanese, American, and even a few British. There are about 240,000 names inscribed.
The park extends to the cliff tops.
The plastic fish were everywhere due to a Japanese holiday.
There were dozens of individual memorials in the park, all overlooking the sea from the cliffs.
... another example.
And the view from the cabins where we stayed. It was nice out, but it was also a bit humid.
