In the brief introduction to the concept of Fuku Yunior says that his Fuku "ain't the scariest, the clearest, the most painful, or the most beautiful. It just happens to be the one that's got its fingers around my throat"(Diaz 6). Fuku is a plague that affects all the characters in "The Brief and Wonderful Life of Oscar Wao" and they have their varying degrees of pain, beauty, and so on, but each character feels like their own Fuku is choking the life out of them. Fuku is a force that rivals the divine, it affects all and controls all like a divine being. Oscar's Fuku is his childhood of loneliness, obesity, and awkwardness. Lola's Fuku is her relationship with her mother and her lack of self identity. Finally there is Beli who is cursed by her past, both her poor decisions in the Dominican Republic and her upbringing after her family died. Fuku is the force that holds ultimate power in Diaz's universe comparable to a divine being. It is said that Fuku is the cause of John F. Kennedy's assassination because he green lit the assassination of Trujillo. Fuku was the reason America lost the Vietnam War because LBJ launched an invasion of the Dominican Republic in the 1960's. Yunior talks about Fuku as if it were God when he says "no matter what you believe, Fuku believes in you" (Diaz 5). The Brief and Wonderful Life of Oscar Wao is a novel filled based in uncertainty no individual can be sure of their fate apart from the fact that they know that Fuku is always close behind. The introductoray quote to the novel is "Of what import are brief nameless lives ... to Galactus??", while Galactus may be a fictional cosmic being of omnipotent power, the quote perfectly describes Fuku. All of the pains and misfortunes of the characters are unimportant and meaningless to the overwhelming power of Fuku.