This Running Incident Happened In 1980. I Was Attending...

Hiroshima, Japan

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Posted:  Thursday, September 21
Runner:  David Velarde Jr.

This running incident happened in 1980. I was attending the world A and H bomb conference in Hiroshima. This particular morning I decided to go for a run. It was raining when I started out and most times when I ran in the four months I was there I would run in a straight line from my destination and back to avoid getting lost. This particular morning I ran about two miles in a westerly direction and for some reason the road ended so I detoured about a block and made a mental note of where I had turned or so I thought. I ran for about another two miles and on the way back I somehow missed the street that I was supposed to have turned to get me on the right path back to the hotel I was staying. I kept on running in the direction I thought I was supposed to be running but I soon realized that I was lost. I felt so alone. After about thirty minutes I figured I was lost so I decided to step into this pharmacy. Not knowing japanese, I gestured that I was lost. It took about five minutes but they finally figured out my predicament. I showed them my room key and they gladly took me back to the hotel. Boy, was I scared. The party of people that I was with had already departed for Nagasaki but they left one person back to wait for me: the person got me on the train and onto Nagasaki. I arrived about two hours later than the rest of the group. Part of the problem is that most of Hiroshima is flat and pretty soon the runner can get confused because most of the post-war construction of buildings in Hiroshima is concrete. Most of the other cities I had visited in Japan had some distinct geographical feature that allowed me to focus on. Hiroshima had none of that. My visit ended well but had I been by myself it might have been another story. Thank you for allowing me to share this bit of information about running in Japan. Note: I haven't been back to the area since 1980 but I try to keep with the news about Japan.

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