Monday 18 August 2008

Describing a building in Tsu City


The most beautiful building in my hometown is Hyakugo Bank Headquarters. It is in the centre of Tsu City in Mie prefecture.

It was built in 1968. A past building had become old, it was built newly. In the 11th floor building, at that time, it was the highest building in Mie prefecture.

Tsu City was bombed to the U. S. Army in World War 2. There weren’t any outmoded buildings in the built-up area because of burnt ruins. If it didn’t encounter war damage, the castle might have been the most famous building.

You can enter to the ground floor because it is a bank window in this building. You cannot go up to the 10th floor and the rooftop because you aren’t the people related to the bank. I guess that view from the rooftop is wonderful. For the east of the building, you can see the Ise-bay and the centrair airport. For the west of it, you can see the expressway and wide rice fields.

There is this building along the route 23.
If you go to Ise Jingu Shrine from Nagano prefecture, you will able to see this building.

4 comments:

  1. Taka,

    Interesting post - I don't know very much about that part of Japan, but I did know Nagoya was flattened during the war. Tsu too? I often wonder what impact the war had around here (Matsumoto) but nobody seems to know.

    I shall look out for the bank building when I go to Ise for my New Year holiday. Well done,

    Jim

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  2. Jim-sensei,

    Yes,Tsu was flattened too. The manufacturing district in the city northern part received the bombing on July 24th, 1945. More than 50 Japanese cities received the bombing. It was only Nagano city that received the bombing in Nagano Prefecture. Matsumoto city did not received the air raid. I think that it was peace and happy.

    Taka

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  3. Hi Taka,

    Unlucky to be bombed so late in the war. I hear there was a Mitsubishi aircraft factory in the tunnels around Iriyamabe. If so, the city escaped.

    Did you know there was a Chinese concentration camp in Namiyanagi?

    Jim

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  4. I didn’t know about that. So I investigated that with web. It was true that there was a Mitsubishi aircraft factory in tunnels under Mt Kinkazan(around Satoyamabe). You can see the diorama of a military factory by the ground floor in the Matsumoto main library. At that time Chinese worked to dig the tunnel compulsorily. I don't know where they lived. I firmly do memorize this fact.

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