“Kyung-sook's mother had taken it as an example that even if you started with nothing, with enough studying, one could accomplish everything.”

“If you thought hard enough, he’d always considered, you could work out everything. The wind, for example. It had always puzzled him until the day he’d realized that it was caused by all the trees waving about.”

“Everything you are used to, once done long enough, starts to seem natural, even though it might not be.”

“Everything you've learned in school as "obvious" becomes less and less obvious as you begin to study the universe. For example, there are no solids in the universe. There's not even a suggestion of a solid. There are no absolute continuums. There are no surfaces. There are no straight lines.”

“Even paradise could become a prison if one had enough time to take notice of the walls.”

“pain is the only real emotion. Everything else can be taken away. Love,happiness,joy can always be taken away. Even old sadness can be dissipated if you pee enough ha-ha into it. But pain is pure”