Contrast Between Father and Son (Through page 130)

There is  a huge contrast between Amir’s old life, and new life as a refugee and living in America. It was a powerful image when Amir said that everything his father has worked for had now been summed up into two travel bags and one disappointing son. It’s ironic that even the wealthy and seeming untouchable people’s lives were now similar to Hazara’s. The Pashtun boys thought that they were superior to Hassan in the same way the Russian soldier thought he was superior to the refugees. However, Baba of course took a fearless stance against it, because he is not afraid to fight for what he wants. It probably cemented the idea in Amir’s head that he was weak and gutless to watch what happened to Amir. His father wanted to protect a woman he did not even know from a man who would not hesitate to kill him. I found it interesting that the author added his first internal thoughts when Amir thought that the Russian fired the gun because the thoughts were selfish. It was a really honest paragraph that reminded me to The Stranger because Amir automatically thought about being abandoned and that now he would have to bury his father, and about any sadness or mourning. Even though many of us partly or completely hate Amir and at this part of the book and were not surprised by those thoughts, I still think that selfishness is alive in all of us. When someone dies part of us do feel those “what about me” thoughts and not just mourning the loss. 

Amir has to live with the constant contrast and reminder that he will not ever be his father.  Like the difference between the rough working hand of Baba and the soft student hand of Amir, they will always be extremely different types of people.  It’s would be hard to live with that pressure and guilt and Amir had to submerge the majority of his emotions. Probably the difference between his father and him also served as a reminder to everything he could not be for when Hasan when he needed him. I think that Baba’s willingness to stay in America and the fact he was proud of him when he graduated high school signifies somewhat a possible shift in his perspective of his son. Like most parents, Baba wants his son to amount to something. His happiness in his son completely relies on quantitative things like did he win the kite race or did he get a diploma. Yet, even though he’s proud of his son for those things I think part of him will always be disappointed, because his son will just never be the person who stands up for a stranger, or even just gives back their food stamps.