Underground

Rarely do I find a book that moves me to tears.

Haruki Murakami's Underground did.

A window to the minds of the Japanese, whose lives were derailed simply because they took the wrong train, wrong carriage at the wrong time. How the Tokyo sarin gas attack changed (or not) their lives.

Imagine just another Monday, catching just another routine rush hour train to work. And just another passenger beside you dropped 2 packets of lethal sarin on the floor of the train carriage. That could be the last Monday of your entire life.

Underground is a chilling account of how the biological terrorism changed some of the perspectives of the victims and the people close to them. A particularly heartbreaking account is that of a pair of siblings, Shizuko & Tatsuo Akashi's. Shizuko was rendered temporarily vegetative, and has since regained consciousness, but have yet recovered from the brain and muscular functions damaged by sarin. The attack robbed her of her speech, memory, mobility and her future. And her brother Tatsuo bears the mental and physical burden of the tragedy that had so wrongly befallen upon them.

However, Shizuko and Tatsuo perservere; trying to move on with their lives and coping with the tragedy. Their story provides us all material for rumination. As Haruki Murakami puts it thoughtfully:

"...what does it mean to be alive? If I were in Shizuko's place, would I have the willpower to live as fully as she? Would I have the courage, or the persistence and determination? Could I hold someone's hand with such warmth and strength? Would the love of others save me? I don't know."
-Haruki Murakami, Underground

～みはる～