Kindness, Compassion, and Selflessness Theme Analysis

The doctor’s long fingers prodded me with surprising force while he dictated the condition of my lungs, heart, hair, teeth, and genitals to his assistant in a voice louder than seemed necessary. He met my gaze only once, when I mentioned that I was a physician, too.

It wasn’t until sometime after I finished my studies and began interning at Tokyo Imperial University Hospital that it dawned on me how incapable I was—how incapable we all were. Medicine was not the noble, enlightened profession I’d envisaged. Patients still died; there was no secret cure. Greater men might be able to achieve more, but not me.

“You think I don’t know that? I’m more than happy to do my fair share. But they’ve got the boys in our tent doing everything—all the shit jobs that they don’t want to do. Just because we’re not like them. Because we don’t kiss their arse, worship their god, bow to their emperor. Tell me something: is your guy helping you out with the work?”

All at once it became clear: this was part of Johnny’s plan to create havoc at camp. Due to jealousy or some personal vendetta, Johnny wanted to bring down the leaders of our compound, and he had somehow convinced Stan that Yamada was to blame for his attack. For all I knew, Stan might have inflicted the wound on himself.

Seeing them play baseball together reminded me of the divers in Broome, who were always so at ease in each other’s company [….] They were my countrymen, but the way they conducted themselves was almost alien to me. To be a diver was to never be alone.

We moved into our new home early in the new year and started on repairs straight away. There were doors to be measured and mats to be ordered. We bought new shutters and installed latches that stopped them from banging in the wind. We replaced our fence with new bamboo stalks, binding them together with rope. We scrubbed the soot from the kitchen, the mould from the bathtub, and the grime from the floors. Kayoko took to the work with a vigour I’d previously only seen in her when she played the koto. She insisted we do everything ourselves. “It’s our first house—it should be just the two of us. We’ll feel more proud this way.” She could be sentimental about such things.

My past failings as a doctor became clear—not just with Stan, but also in Broome and in my previous experience in Japan. I had been wrong to leave the kindness of the human touch to Sister Bernice and others. In keeping my silence, I hadn’t exercised the very quality that makes us human: our capacity to understand each other.

Sister Bernice gazed at me. “Don’t you realise what this means? We’re at war with Japan now. You mustn’t stay here. It isn’t safe.” Perhaps mistaking my silence for shock, she continued to speak. “They’ll come for you—they’ll put you away. You should have left a long time ago.”

Her face was creased in anguish. I felt a great tenderness towards her at that moment. “Thank you for your concern, Sister, but you need not worry—I have prepared myself for this outcome.”

Yamada stared at me, looking deep into my soul. A feeling of shame rose up through my body, filling my chest and throat. As much as I wanted to deny it, I know he was right. My refusal to believe Stan had prompted his deterioration. For that, I couldn’t forgive myself.

The ceremony was originally intended for only a small group of Stan’s friends—mainly the Australian-born Japanese and me—but that afternoon more than thirty people lined the path that snaked through the garden. For someone so quiet, Stan had many friends.

We reached the junction at the middle of camp and I looked back. The blur of my friends pressed against the fence. The sweep of ochre dirt. The rows of galvanized-iron huts. The guard tower rising up beyond the fence. It was bleak, but it was home. A place where I belonged.

“To give one’s life to one’s country, for the greater good of all—it’s the greatest sacrifice. They’re true heroes,” he said, shaking his head. Everyone around me nodded.

But as I thought of the men in their metal coffin, their final breath escaping from their lungs, I imagined them at peace with themselves, knowing what they had done. It is much harder to descend to the depths of suffering and then find a way to keep living. I know, because that is what I have done.

In the coffee shop, a dark figure came towards me. My heart fluttered when I realized it was Kayoko. She wore navy monpe trousers knotted above her waist and a matching coat. In the unfamiliar clothes, I hardly recognised my wife. Grey threaded her hair. Her cheeks had lost their fullness and her mouth was tight. We sat together, the hum of conversation surrounding us as we shared fragments of our pasts. She smiled when I told her about releasing the lanterns in Broome and the baseball competition at camp. She described the friends she had made at the factory where she worked, assembling munitions parts.