Summary

In “The Easy Job in the Hut in the Big Forest,” when the narrator told Mrs. Masakado about the postering office’s disappearance, she explained that Mr. Monaga had had to move onto another job urgently (303). When Mrs. Masakado broached the topic of the narrator’s next job, the narrator felt disinterested in working at all (305). Because of her desire to work alone and be outside, Mrs. Masakado suggested “An easy desk job in a hut in a big forest” (306). She would work for Ōbayashi Daishinrin Park, “under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries” (306). The park was famous for its discovery of an early human fossil. The human “from whom the fossil had come” was called “‘the Ōbayashi hominin’” (309).

The narrator met her new boss Mr. Hakota. He led her through...