I love jesus

Jeremy Lee
Ms. Masuda
Lit/Writ 5
November 26, 2013
The Garden Samurai In the book, The Samurai’s Garden by Gail Tsukiyama, Stephen, who has a disease called tuberculosis, goes to Tarumi, Japan away from his family to recover. In Tarumi, Stephen meets Matsu, who takes care of Stephen for the rest of the novel. Stephen begins to learn about Matsu’s past, and comes to find out that it is scarred with many memories of his sister’s death, the death of his closest friend, Kenzo, and his leprosy inflicted friend, Sachi. Throughout the novel, Tsukiyama shows that Matsu triumphed over many adversities such as coping with his best friend, and sisters death by relying on Stephen and trusting him with information of his past life, and by helping Sachi with leprosy by convincing her to not commit suicide; from this he learns that relying and telling people of his past can help cope with his present problems. Matsu relies more and more upon Stephen throughout the novel, but not until he gets to know Stephen for a longer period of time does he trust him with certain information about his past, such as information about Tomoko, his sister’s death. Matsu as a youth, was very quiet, but after his sister, Tomoko’s suicide, he becomes even more secretive, and overall does not like to tell people about his past. Matsu’s secrecy is evident when Stephen’s father recalls, “If you can get anything out of Matsu, I’ll say you’ve accomplished quite a feat. He isn’t the kind who will likely tell you his thoughts,” (Tsukiyama 38). While the reason why Matsu tells Stephen about his past is not completely evident, we can be certain that Matsu did not tell Stephens father about his past, which is why he said it would be “quite a feat”. While the text does say that Matsu kept to himself when younger, even among his friends such as Sachi, Matsu sharing his past with Stephen shows how close they have become over the period of time they have been together. In the end of the story, Matsu’s trust and friendship for Stephen shows when Stephen says goodbye to him: “I don’t think anyone else could have done a better job taking care of me”. Matsu then replies with, “I sometimes think it has been the other way around”. While this could be interpreted as Matsu showing respect to Stephen, it could also be interpreted as Matsu truly appreciating Stephen’s company. Matsu is also implying that by being “taken care” of Stephen, that no one else has given him the comfort and support throughout the adversities he faced, such as moral support during Kenzo’s death, or the physical support when Yamaguchi burnt down. All in all, Stephen is the main reason Matsu gets through his adversities, both morally and physically. When Sachi finds out she has leprosy, she attempts to take the road that Tomoko took and attempted to commit seppuku, or suicide, and this affects Matsu because he does not want Tomoko’s best friend to die like she did. However she does not have the courage required to commit suicide and runs away from Tarumi to a forest near a leper colony named Yamaguchi. Matsu finds Sachi hiding in the forest, and when Sachi asks him how he found her, he answers “I followed you and the others down to the beach yesterday morning. I wondered if you might try to find your way to peace as she did”. (Tsukiyama 136) While the reason Matsu saves Sachi may simply be because he is just a nice person, the reason may also be because he could not save Tomoko, and saving Sachi, Tomokos best friend makes up for it. Also, the fact that Matsu follows Sachi to the beach and then looks for her in the forest for many hours may be because he has a personal affection for her, which later in the book reveals to be true. Much later in the story, Kenzo finds out that Sachi is still alive, and finds out about Sachi and Matsu’s intimate relationship. Kenzo becomes enraged, and curses at Sachi, and soon after commits suicide because he feels betrayed that his best friend has had a relationship with her that he could never have. After Kenzos death, Stephen describes Matsu’s relationship with Sachi as “It was as if he were purposely staying away from Sachi, as if Kenzos death had made them strangers”. (Tsukiyama 111) Matsu feels as though he were responsible for Kenzos death, and through purposely (Tsukiyama 111) staying away from Sachi, he feels less guilty about Kenzo’s death. Stephen also says that they were like “strangers”(Tsukiyama 111), which means that their relationship was as though they have never met before and shows how much Kenzo’s death affected both of them. Matsu, distances himself with Sachi enough for a outsider to consider them as strangers however. after a while Matsu and Sachi start visiting again, Stephen describes Matsu as much happier. All in all, through these two occasions of hardship throughout Matsu and Sachi’s relationship, it shows that Matsu overcome his personal challenges as he still maintains a relationship with Sachi. Later, Stephen assumedly recovers from tuberculosis and returns to Kobe, Japan to his father’s home. However to Stephen, meeting and befriending Matsu, and helping him overcome his adversities by learning about his dark past was the highlight of his time spend at Tarumi. Throughout the time that Stephen stayed at Tarumi, Matsu encountered some hardships such as his best friend Kenzo’s death and his up and down relationship, but in the end triumphs over these hardships. All in all, Matsu triumphing over his adversities shows that relying on people and sharing seemingly private information can help to overcome certain adversity.