Bheela’s Blog -124
11 June 2023
Episode 123 Recap
Ryuzo is highly rigid about going for the landfill project, despite Oshin’s warnings on the risks involved. Oshin feels miserable.
Fuji visits Kaga-ya to meet the old Ms. Kuni and the family. Neither Fuji nor anyone in the Kaga-ya family knows about Oshin’s miseries.
It is New Year’s Eve, and when everyone celebrates, Oshin sits alone. A postman brings a letter from Ms. Taka with the news of rebuilding her shop in March. Oshin is filled with hope.
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Episode 124
FLASHBACK CONTINUES
1923 brought many changes to Oshin. Now, in Saga, she celebrates the New Year of 1924. She sits alone in her room with a postcard from Taka, which brings cheers to her otherwise unhappy life. She looks at the letter several times. She touches it to her forehead, thinking it to be a gift from God.
She is convinced she will return to Tokyo in March to work for Taka in her new shop.
Suddenly, she hears footsteps. She keeps the letter inside her dress folds.
‘It is the New Year; cheer up!’ says Ryuzo as he enters the room. He sits before Oshin and continues, ‘Mother worries that you are being so unfriendly. Can’t you try a little harder? She is hard on you because you are always sulking. I have to listen to her complaints.’
‘I am not sulking,’ replies Oshin, but her face remains sad.
‘Then come have a drink with everybody.’
‘Your sister is here; it is best if I stay away.’
‘This is what I mean; that is why they are upset with you. If you think you are disliked, try to get people to like you,’ Ryuzo gets impatient.
‘What more can I do? I want to be liked and live happily, too. I was willing to do anything to get your mother to like me. But nothing works for me,’ Oshin seems tired.
‘It is your duty as my wife to try harder. If this rift gets any greater, you will suffer more! That is why I am telling this to you now,’ Ryuzo persists.
‘Don’t worry about it, I don’t mind,’ Oshin looks disinterested; she plays with Yu’s toy and doesn’t even look at Ryuzo.
‘What do you mean you don’t mind? If you think like that, you will never get along with my mother. I can’t stand it. I feel bothered when you sulk. I can’t blame my mother for getting angry! I have had enough of this. If you refuse to listen, I don’t care what you do with yourself.’ Ryuzo bangs his fist on the ground and gets up.
Oshin stops him holding his arm. The anger inside her is brewing, too. But she tries again, ‘Sweetheart! You really plan on staying here?’
‘I have told you,’ shouts Ryuzo.
‘Please think it over,’ pleads Oshin.
‘I am betting on my success with the reclaimed land. Don’t bring it up again!’ Ryuzo leaves her hand and walks off.
***
Ms. Kiyo, with her husband and daughter, laughs at some joke. They are celebrating New Year’s Eve.
‘You better stop; it is all right!’ Ms. Kiyo takes out a sake bottle from the ice box.
‘What about you, Atsuko?’ Ms. Kiyo offers sake to her daughter.
‘Ryuzo is back,’ says Atsuko.
‘I need a separate room,’ declares Ryuzo as he sits next to his sister, fuming, ‘The attic will do.’
Daigor and Kiyo freeze seeing Ryuzo making a declaration this way.
‘What’s wrong?’ asks Kiyo.
‘I want to be alone; I am sick of Oshin! I never realized she is like that,’ says Ryuzo, complaining.
‘What are you saying?’ Daigoro is shocked, ‘A couple can’t live separately under one roof!’
‘Oshin won’t even try to understand how I feel. She just presses for her own way! I am tired of it.’
‘Don’t say that. If you forsake Oshin, what will happen to her? She only has you to lean on. Talk it over with her,’ says Daigoro; he is genuinely concerned for Oshin.
‘You can’t talk to her!’ Retorts Ryuzo.
‘You married her because you loved her!’ reminds Daigoro.
‘Even love can fade with time. He has finally realized what she is really like,’ remarks Kiyo; she gets sadistic pleasure in this situation. She continues, ‘We have extra rooms. You don’t need to stay in the attic. You can have the room next to ours. I knew this would happen one day.’
‘Poor Ryuzo, you married the wrong woman; that is why you lost everything,’ Atsuko joins her mother in taunting Ryuzo.
‘She made him build that factory and everything. It is all Oshin’s fault!’ Kiyo adds fuel to the fire.
‘It is not too late; divorce her!’ suggests Atsuko, ‘that is best if you plan on staying here.’
‘Marry a Saga woman! Even Tsuneko, I didn’t like her at first, but she patiently obeyed me, not like Oshin!’ says Kiyo.
‘I know a lot of single girls you could meet!’ chirps Atsuko.
‘Stop it! I won’t allow him to throw Oshin out!’ shouts Daigoro; he has enough of this silly conversation.
‘But the marriage is over if he wants to keep separate rooms,’ says Atsuko.
‘It is best to get it over quickly,’ adds her mother.
Ryuzo is somewhat shocked at the suggestions of his mother and sister; he speaks up, ‘I didn’t say I wanted to divorce her. She is Yu’s mother! I couldn’t do that.’
‘I can raise Yu for you!’ replies Kiyo promptly.
‘It is just that she unnerves me every time I see her,’ Ryuzo clarifies.
‘You still have feelings for a woman like that?’ says Atsuko.
‘She is good inside. But she is a little stubborn. If we sleep separately, she will come around,’ Ryuzo smiles at the thought.
‘Too bad, I was hoping that you had finally opened your eyes,’ Atsuko continues to persist.
‘Never mind, maybe Oshin will leave with her own will,’ says Kiyo.
***
Oshin writes a letter in her room when Kiyo and Atsuko enter.
‘Oshin, I am taking Ryuzo’s bedding out; he will be sleeping in the room next to mine. He says he doesn’t want to see your face. I guess he has had enough of you complaining every time he sees you,’ says Kiyo. She is triumphant and has sarcasm in her voice.
Oshin lowers her eyes.
Oshin doesn’t say a word; she gets up and helps lift the bedding.
‘I will do it,’ Atsuko comes forward and snatches the bed from Oshin.
‘If you want to leave, I won’t stop you,’ says Kiyo as she leaves the room, lifting the bed roll.
It has finally come to this, thinks Oshin. If Ryuzo drifted so far away from her, she no longer had any reason to stay here. Oshin drops to her knees. She wants to leave that very instant. Fuji, Kayo, Taka, Ken, and Kota’s faces appear before her, and she misses them all. She rests her head against the writing desk. She realizes that there is no one she can turn to now.
But in March, Taka will open her new salon. She keeps telling herself that. Oshin goes to the fields the following day, plowing the new plot of the area with Yu tied to her back. All she has to do is to wait until spring. She just has to bear it until then.
In her room, she looks at her stuff, some clothes, the kokeshi doll her mother gave her when she was a little girl, and the harmonica.
‘Mother, I won’t give up! In the spring, I am going to Tokyo. I only have to wait until spring. Just until spring!’ Oshin talks to herself as if she is writing to Fuji. She looks up towards the window, which lets faint light enter her room.
BACK IN THE PRESENT
‘This headstone seems awfully neglected.,’ says Kei. He helps Oshin clean the stone area. Oshin and Kei are now at Saga, visiting a cemetery.
Oshin says, ‘Genji had worked for the Tanokura family all his life. He never married, and he had no family of his own. My mother-in-law built this grave for him. No one remembers him. And I haven’t been here in 60 years.’
Oshin places fresh flowers on the tomb and says, ‘I used to come here a lot when I lived here. I would cry thinking how I could have used his support during my hard times.’
‘That is not like you at all,’ comments Kei, ‘you were liked wherever you went! At Kaga-ya and at Taka’s salon, too. I guess your mother-in-law was pretty terrible. Why didn’t you try to get her to understand you? That is how you always handle matters.’
‘Back then, a bride couldn’t talk back to her mother-in-law,’ explains Oshin.
‘That is silly!’
‘That is how things were. Everyone accepted it, and we all tried to bear it.’ Oshin gets up after putting flowers and takes a deep breath. She sighs and says, ‘Come to think of it, maybe it was my fault. I knew she was against our marriage, but we got married anyway, so no wonder she hated me.’ she pours some water from a pale on the flower bed.
‘I should have known. I didn’t have to get so upset about it.’ says Oshin after a pause.
‘But you persevered!’ Kei says with his usual admiration for his grandma.
‘I wanted to come back to Tokyo. That desire kept me going, and others disliked me more for my attitude. I must have been pretty bad!’ Oshin laughs as she analyzes the events of her past with her grandson.
‘I guess you were both pretty bad. Both of you were butting heads. I guess that is how it is with one’s in-laws,’ says Kei with all his childish wisdom.
Oshin laughs and says, ‘I pity the man caught between his wife and mother. Both sides would complain to him. I think your grandfather had it the worst.’
‘I guess so; it is bad when your wife and mother always fight one another.’
‘That is why I never gave any of my daughters-in-law a hard time.’ says Oshin.
‘You never do complain to Aunt Michiko. I guess all your hard times weren’t wasted,’ says Kei thoughtfully.
‘But they all complain about me anyways. And I could relate to how Ms. Kiyo felt for the first time.’ says Oshin.
Oshin then looks at the cleaned-up headstone of Genzi and says, ‘Genji, do you remember the times I would come and talk to you here?’ Oshin, with teary eyes, thinks again of the past.
FLASHBACK RETURNS
During her difficult time, when Ryuzo stops talking to her, Oshin visits Genji’s grave. She puts some wildflowers on the headstone.
‘Genji,’ she takes his name in front of the tomb affectionately. She looks back at Yu, tied to her shoulders.
Suddenly she hears some commotion.
‘It is drowning! Rush! Some men run and shout.
Startled, Oshin runs behind the crowd.
‘A suicide!’ A man shouts.
Oshin gets alarmed and runs in the direction where the men are heading.
Some men crowd near the field at a spot. Oshin tries to make space, and she comes forward.
It is Sawa! Oshin is shocked. She bends close to Sawa’s still body soaked in water.
‘Why did you do this?’ Oshin shouts, clutching Sawa’s shoulders. She pats her face calling her name. She rubs Sawa’s palms. Sawa opens her eyes.
‘She has come to sense!’ a man says.
Oshin can understand how Sawa felt. If Oshin didn’t have the hope of leaving this place for Tokyo, she might have done the same thing.
What will happen now? Will Sawa’s suicide attempt prompt Oshin to take some drastic steps?
We will know more in the coming episode, no 125, soon.