Yu Miri 소설 "Tokyo Ueno Station"

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Yu Miri, "Tokyo Ueno Station" (2014)

(Translated by Morgan Giles)

 

NPR 서평

 

본문에서

 

   "Oh, it's muggy," Mari said, half opening the screened window. A damp wind and the sound of rain came rolling in. The smell of rain in my nose, I ate the scrambled eggs and toast that Mari had made, then said good-bye to her and the dog from the entrance hall as they drove off. She's just turned twenty-one, I thought. She shouldn't be tied down here with her granddad.

   "Sorry for leaving so suddenly. Grandpa's gone to Tokyo. I won't be coming back to the house again. Please don't come looking for me. Thank you for always making me such nice breakfasts." I wrote on a piece of papaer to leave for her; then I took the black carry-all I used for work out of a closet and put my personal belongings in it.

   At Kashima Station I got on the Joban Line, and I got off at Ueno, the last stop. (p. 129)

 

   The yellow of the ginkgo leaves poured into my eyes like paint dissolving into water. Each leaf had a golden glow that was almost too beautiful -- the ones that danced in the air, the soggy ones trampled on by people, and the ones that still clung to their branches.

   Since I became homeless, my only interest in ginkgoes was the fruit. Wearing plastic gloves, I picked them up one by one and put them in a plastic bag. When it was full, I took them to the water fountain and washed off the part of the skin that stank. Then I would spread them out on a newspaper to dry before taking them to Ameyoko Market, where I could get seven hundred yen a kilo for them. (p. 172)

 

 

 

 

유미리 (사진: 동아일보)

 

"She relocatd to Fukushima in 2025 and opened a bookstore and theater space to continue her cultural work in collaboration with those affected by the disaster." --- 책 말미 저자 소개에서.

 

 

Ueno Park Homeless, Tokyo