- Dusty: American saw cuts on a push stroke, Japanese saw cuts on a pull stroke. When an American cracks up, he opens up the window and shoots up a bunch of strangers. When a Japanese cracks up, he closes the window and kills himself. Everything is in reverse.
- Dusty: This Giri...
- Tanaka Ken: Giri? Hai.
- Dusty: It means obligation, right?
- Tanaka Ken: Burden.
- Dusty: Burden?
- Tanaka Ken: It's called, 'the burden hardest to bear.'
- Dusty: Yeah, well, suppose you don't bear it. I mean, no one's going to come down on you?
- Tanaka Ken: No.
- Dusty: Well, you guys believe in some kind of Heaven and Hell?
- Tanaka Ken: No.
- Dusty: Then what is it you believe in that makes you do it?
- Tanaka Ken: Giri.
- Harry Kilmer: Everywhere I look, I can't recognize a thing.
- Oliver Wheat: It's still there. Farmers in the countryside may watch TV from their tatami mats, and you can't see Fuji through the smog - but don't let it fool you. It's still Japan, and the Japanese are still Japanese.
- Dusty: That guy doesn't like you.
- Harry Kilmer: No, not much.
- Dusty: So how come you figure you can trust him?
- Harry Kilmer: Giri.
- Dusty: Gitty?
- Harry Kilmer: Giri. Obligation.
- Dusty: You mean he figures he owes you something?
- Harry Kilmer: Yeah, sort of.
- Dusty: Well, that can work two ways, Kilmer. If you ain't alive tomorrow, he don't owe you shit.
- Goro: Ken is a tormented man. It is Eiko, of course, but it is also Japan. Ken is a relic, a leftover of another age, of another country.
- Eiko Tanaka: Did you speak to Ken?
- Harry Kilmer: Yeah
- Eiko Tanaka: Does he know we are here?
- Harry Kilmer: Sure.
- Eiko Tanaka: Is he unhappy?
- Harry Kilmer: I'm on my way over to see him now.
- Eiko Tanaka: But is he unhappy?
- Harry Kilmer: Of course he's unhappy, he's been unhappy ever since he lost the war. I keep trying to tell him it's not his fault, he won't take my word for it.