The kimono is emblematic of the love Sadako’s family has for her, and the family and cultural traditions that they still, against all odds, hope she will one day be able to be a part of. However, as her family and Chizuko attempt to lift her spirits, Sadako settles into the sad realization that she will never get better, and though she cannot happily accept the kimono as a touchstone or an object of hope, she turns to her cranes for comfort one final time. By this point in the book the symbolism of the cranes has become more complicated. Initially they symbolized Sadako’s hopes of recovery. But as that recovery became ever more unrealistic, and Sadako nonetheless kept making cranes, they have become something else: a symbol of both Sadako’s perseverance in the face of hopelessness, and a dream of freedom from suffering that connects to both Sadako’s desire for an escape from her personal suffering and the broader hope for a world that does not inflict such suffering through war or violence.