It is all the same, the mind is the brain, the mind is the soul, the soul is the brain, etc…All [the mind] wants is to understand itself.
-- Hiroji ("Janie")

Importance: Hiroji makes this statement during a neurology lecture, articulating the idea that the brain is the physical manifestation and reality of an individual. This idea helps to frame the overall narrative of how one's past inextricably affects both one's mind and one's identity.

[Cambodia's] beauty, unchanged, unremitting, opened a wound in me.
-- Janie ("Janie")

Importance: Janie makes this statement regarding a time that she and her husband flew over Cambodia in an airplane on their way to Malaysia. The idea of a wound opening foreshadows the post-traumatic stress that is awakened in Janie as she helps Hiroji track down his brother.

Hiroji had been seeking information for years, but despite his efforts he had never found any trace of his brother.
-- Janie ("Hiroji")

Importance: This quotation helps...