Amida-do dayori
2002
Oume: These 'novels' of yours ... are they 'lies' or are they true stories? Takao Ueda: Well, they are not 'true'. Maybe they're lies told in order to tell the truth. All right, then ... you can't eat burdock straight from the field but you can cook it to make kinpira. If you ask which is 'real', it's burdock from the field ... but if it wasn't kinpira you'd never know how good it was.
Sayuri: (write on a piece of paper) I think a novel is Amitabha taking the form of words.
Oume: When it rains and I can't get around much, I don't sleep very well. Takao Ueda: What do you do then? Oume: Then I just listen to the water flowing over there and imagine that I was water, too. I think of myself just flowing along, and suddenly there I am asleep. Oume: When you turn to water, where do you flow to? Oume: Well, I flow with the water ... way, way, far away ... and about time I'm thinking I've reached the sea, there I am asleep. Michiko Ueda: We hear the sound of the river every night, but I don't feel like that. Oume: You're both still young. You've still got to listen to a lot of things. The river's there, and you have to hear it ... but the sound of water's no use to you. It's something for old folks to listen to.
Michiko Ueda: I love this ... it's like the mountain's rocking us to sleep.
Dr Nakamura: Forgive me for asking, but what are you doing in Yanaka Vilage? Shouldn't you be somewhere closer to the front lines? Michiko Ueda: Call me a drop-out if you want, Dr Nakamura. I don't mind. Dr Nakamura: I'm sorry. I didn't mean that. Michiko Ueda: It's all right. I don't think there's anything wrong with it ... In Tokyo I was always trying to be everyone's idea of perfect and at the same time live up to my own ideals. I couldn't take it. Dr Nakamura: I shouldn't have pried. I tend to be solitary by nature. I have a bad habit of testing people to see if they're sympathetic. I'm sorry.
Oume: Amitabha! May your name be praised! Heal Sayuri, please! May your name be praised! ... I'm worried sick about her, you know. But when I sit here and look out over the valley after while, it brings me peace.
Michiko Ueda: (after a miscarriage) They say the child chooses its parents, don't they? And I just wasn't chosen. Why? Why?
Michiko Ueda: The way you think about life and about death changes as you get older.
Michiko Ueda: A good death is part of a good life.
Shigenaga Koda: (lying on tatami, terminally ill) Will you be all right? Mrs Koda: I'll be fine. Shigenaga Koda: I'll go on ahead, then. Mrs Koda: I won't keep you waiting long. (Shigenaga Koda closes his eyes and dies)