宇品本通郵便局 (Ujina Hondori Post Office) - Hiroshima-shi, Hiroshima
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It was an exciting day (but also a bit nervous) for me because for the first time, I would go to get fukeiin with a non-postcard-exchanging friend! 😂 I planned this half-day trip for a few days, giving a few area options for my friend to choose from. In the end, we decided to go to Ujina, where neither of us had gone before. The weather was sunny, a good day to explore a new area.
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Ujina is a district and port area in Minami-ku, Hiroshima. It serves as a major passenger terminal offering regular ferry services to nearby islands in Hiroshima Bay (Etajima, Miyajima, and Ninoshima) as well as Matsuyama in Shikoku. Some international cruises also stop there. You can reach Ujina seaside by taking the Hiroden streetcar to Ujina and getting off at Kaigandori.
After getting off at Kaigandori station, I used Google Maps to guide us to a cozy cafe with a sea view that I had found on Google. I knew we were definitely walking closer towards the sea, but the surrounding buildings were offices, so we were like, "Are we going to the right place?" Along the way, we passed this abandoned old building, which used to be the Hiroshima Prefecture Port Administration Building. It's a wooden building with a mix of Japanese and Western styles.
We arrived at an industrial-looking building that says "Flex Gallery." The cafe was supposed to be inside the building. Stepping inside, it turned out to be a select shop selling a variety of goods, including furniture. The cafe that we chose, 24/7 Coffee & Roaster Ujina, was located on the second floor of the building. We could see some people queuing at lunchtime, so we decided to book our spots too. After waiting for a while, the waiter called us and led us to our seats. They had an interesting lunch set where we could choose 3 side dishes along with rice (white or multi-grained), shiru, and gansu (a crispy fried fish cake from Kure City, Hiroshima). Everything was delicious! Maybe next time I should try the donburi (rice bowl).
I chose an omelette with shrimp, renkon (lotus root), and chicken nanban. They also offered coffee. For black coffee, you can choose from three roasts: 白金 shirogane (light-bodied), 金色 konjiki (medium roast), and 赤銅 shakudou (full-bodied). I was about to choose from one of them until I saw that their milk coffee was served in an earthenware, like matcha. This I've got to try! They served the coffee after we finished our meal. It had a rich flavor, and the earthenware definitely enhanced the experience. We chatted about our lives, Japanese learning, work, and other stuff. All while enjoying the sea view and the coffee.
Since both of us enjoyed the meal and the coffee, we concluded that the desserts would taste amazing as well. We decided to share their coffee bean mocha and mascarpone hot cake. It was so yummy!
After the fulfilling lunch, we checked the goods at the select shop. Obviously, I went straight to the stationery area to find some postcards. They didn't have any specific Japan-themed or Hiroshima-themed postcards, but I found some cool animal and cat postcards to adopt. Next, I went to check on some colorful, patterned socks. I asked my friend to pick a pair of socks for me, and she asked me to pick for her.
Since we went all the way to the seaside, it was time to enjoy the view! It was a sunny day, and the sun was glaring, but the feel of the sea breeze and the magnificent view of Hiroshima Bay more than made up for it. We took a couple of photos and sat on the bench for a while before heading to the post office.
You can reach Ujina Hondori Post Office by taking the Hiroden Street Car to Ujina and getting off at the Ujina Gochome station. But since we came from the Kaigandoori side, it was only a 12-minute walk.
For this day, I had prepared four postcards. They would go to Indonesia, Italy, the Netherlands, and Poland. I bought a plain postcard to write my address on, went to the counter to request fukeiin on all the postcards, and posted them. I hope all of them reach their new homes safely. One big thing I learn from exchanging postcards is to let go. Writing, preparing, and posting the postcards are my responsibilities, but once I hand them over to the post office, they're out of my control. I can't track them, and they're pretty unpredictable—sometimes they arrive really fast, sometimes they take their sweet time, and sometimes they don't arrive at all. Understanding the risk and not fussing when things don't go as planned helps me to ease up a bit on my perfectionism. I still have a long way to go, though.
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A few days later, my postcard with the fukeiin arrived. It features an image of the port and a statue of Senda Sadaaki, the governor of Hiroshima during the Meiji Period, who is also credited with developing Ujina Port.
From the Japan Post official website: "The fukeiin depicts the bronze statue of Governor Senda, a stone monument to the song 'Port' (a song written in the Meiji Period about Ujina Port), Hiroshima Port, and a ship." The fuke iin was launched on November 3rd, 1984.
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