Hashima Island

Hashima Island, Japan

Hashima Island's concrete towers and curved sea wall stand against the sea at sunset, lit gold along their edges.

Hashima Island is a tiny concrete coal-mining island off Nagasaki, left to the weather since 1974 and now reached by licensed tour boat.

The place

Hashima Island lies in the sea about 15 kilometres from Nagasaki and is known to almost everyone as Gunkanjima (軍艦島), 'Battleship Island', because its sea wall and crowded towers look like a warship from the water. The island is tiny, a little over six hectares, and every part of it was once put to use: flats, a school, a hospital, shops and gardens on the rooftops. Today nobody lives there. What remains is a dense mass of grey concrete blocks with stairwells open to the sky, rusted pipework and a sea wall that still keeps the waves off the ruins. Nature is slowly taking over, with weeds growing from window frames and salt eating into the concrete. Some collapsed walls have been shored up so that visitors can be landed, but most of the island is seen from fenced walkways rather than explored freely. Hashima is one of hundreds of uninhabited islands in Nagasaki Prefecture, yet it is the one people cross the water to see. Its meaning is mixed. It stands for the speed of Japan's industrialisation, and it also stands for the forced labour of Korean civilians and Chinese prisoners of war before and during the Second World War. Many visitors find the mood quieter and more sombre than the photographs suggest. The coal mine is part of the Sites of Japan's Meiji Industrial Revolution World Heritage listing. For landing arrangements, check the official site at http://www.gunkanjima-nagasaki.jp/.

Its story

Hashima Island had a short and intense working life. Coal was known in the area from the early nineteenth century, and undersea mining began in 1887. Mitsubishi bought the island in 1890 and sank deeper shafts beneath the seabed, while new land and high seawalls enlarged the rock to about three times its natural size. Underground it was hot and humid, hard on the men at the coal face. In 1916 the company raised a seven-storey reinforced-concrete apartment block, partly as protection from typhoons, and further blocks followed over the decades. A school, kindergarten, hospital, town hall, cinema, baths, a swimming pool and a pachinko parlour turned the rock into a self-contained town. Population rose until, by 1959, 5,259 people were living on a few hectares. From the 1930s until 1945, Korean civilians and Chinese prisoners of war were put to work in the mine under brutal treatment, and that history shaped much of the argument when the site was put forward for World Heritage status, which was approved in 2015 after long dispute. As coal reserves ran low, the mine shut in 1974 and the residents left soon afterwards. The island then stood empty for decades. Interest returned in the 2000s because the ruins had been left so untouched, and tourist landings began again in 2009.

What to see

Culture

Hashima Island carries two cultural stories that sit uneasily together. One is the daily life of a mining community: families in tiny flats, children at the island's school, films at the cinema, and a company that supplied homes, baths and shops in return for dangerous work underground. Former residents and their descendants keep those memories alive, and for many of them the island is remembered as home rather than as a ruin. The other story is the forced labour of Korean civilians and Chinese prisoners of war during the war years, which remains painful and politically sensitive in Japan, Korea and China. How that history was presented was one of the sticking points in the island's World Heritage approval, and visitors will meet differing views on whether the interpretation goes far enough. A guidance centre in Tokyo, the Industrial Heritage Information Center, was set up to explain the wider group of Meiji industrial sites, and Nagasaki's own museums add context about the region's wartime past. Tours run on licensed boats and depend on the sea, so landings are cancelled when conditions are rough. It helps to treat the island as both a heritage site and a memorial rather than a film set. Stay on the marked walkways, never enter or climb the unstable buildings, and keep voices low and photography respectful, as many people regard the place as one of mourning.

What to wear

Hashima Island never had a dress tradition of its own; the families who lived there wore what the rest of Japan wore, with the kimono and the lighter cotton yukata kept for festivals, weddings and summer evenings. Kimono are traditionally made of silk, yukata of cotton, and both are tied with an obi sash. In daily island life the look was practical: miners in heavy work clothes, helmets and boots against heat, wet and coal dust, and children in school uniform. Today nobody lives on Hashima, so what people wear there is what visitors bring. In Nagasaki, locals dress in ordinary modern city clothes, and kimono are mostly seen at festivals or on tourists in rental outfits. For the trip, wear closed, flat shoes with a good grip, because the landing stage and paths are uneven and can be wet. Bring a light waterproof layer and a windproof top, since the boat crossing is exposed even on warm days, and add a hat and sunscreen in summer, as there is little shade ashore. Long trousers are sensible on rough ground. There is no formal dress code, but plain, modest clothing suits a place that many regard as a memorial. Avoid heels and open sandals, and carry a small bag so both hands are free on steps and rails.

What to eat

Plan it

Best time. April–May and October–November, when the weather is mild and the sea is more often calm enough for landings; summer is hot and humid, late-summer typhoons can cancel boats, and winter crossings can be cold and rough.

How long. 1–2

Getting there. Fly to Nagasaki Airport and take a limousine bus into the city centre, or come by train from Fukuoka, changing at Takeo-Onsen onto the Kamome shinkansen. The last leg to the island is a licensed tour boat from Nagasaki's harbour; see the official site, http://www.gunkanjima-nagasaki.jp/, for operators and landing arrangements.

Budget. mid

Tips

Etiquette

Nearby

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