Today our destination was Minamata. First, we had a wonderful breakfast in the hotel which I was sure everyone loved it. We decided to sleep in the bus while travelling towards Minamata because it was to be one and a half hours of travelling and most of us did not have good sleep the previous night.

In Minamata, we first went to the Eco-Park to see the memorial built for the victims who died due to the Minamata disease. For a moment, I felt sad for the victims, but later felt happy when I saw the beautiful view of the sea and the island of the Japan shore. All of us started takin photos of each other.

We made our way to the Minamata Municipal Museum to enquire more on the cause of the disease which was mercury poisoning. A victim of the disease was kind enough to share her heart warming experience. We felt sympathetic towards her family as she lost her father and grandfather due to the Minamata disease. We learned that the disease was transmitted via the consumption of fish in the mercury contaminated rivers and also learned that we should be more responsible towards taking care of our environment.

Next we went to have our lunch at one of the resturants near the Minamata Municipal Museum. Finally, we went to the factory where soaps were made from used cooking oil. We saw a video which proved that the soap they make is much better than the others. We were later taught how to make the soap and we did it with a lot of teamwork!! In fact today was all about responsibility and teamwork!!


Jeeva