:27:00
People have their pictures taken in front of the ditch.
:27:02
Across from it souvenir lighters are sold shaped like grenades.
:27:12
On Hayao's machine war resembles letters being burned,
shredded in a frame of fire.
:27:17
The code name for Pearl Harbor was Tora, Tora, Tora,
the name of the cat the couple in Gokokuji was praying for.
:27:25
So all of this will have begun with the name of a cat pronounced three times.
:27:38
Off Okinawa kamikaze dived on the American fleet;
they would become a legend.
:27:44
They were likelier material for it obviously than the special units
who exposed their prisoners to the bitter frost of Manchuria
:27:50
and then to hot water so as to see
how fast flesh separates from the bone.
:27:54
One would have to read their last letters to learn
that the kamikaze weren't all volunteers,
:27:59
nor were they all swashbuckling samurai.
:28:01
Before drinking his last cup of saké Ryoji Uebara had written:
:28:07
"I have always thought that Japan must live free in order to live eternally.
:28:10
It may seem idiotic to say that today, under a totalitarian regime.
:28:15
We kamikaze pilots are machines, we have nothing to say,
except to beg our compatriots to make Japan the great country of our dreams.
:28:24
In the plane I am a machine, a bit of magnetized metal
that will plaster itself against an aircraft carrier.
:28:30
But once on the ground I am a human being
with feelings and passions.
:28:34
Please excuse these disorganized thoughts.
:28:37
I'm leaving you a rather melancholy picture,
but in the depths of my heart I am happy.
:28:41
I have spoken frankly, forgive me."