First Period Blog

First Period Blog

Sunday, November 24, 2013

The Downfall of The Good Life

This was a painful part of the book to read because things just took a turn for the worst for all characters and Amir’s lies and cowardice took its toll in the family and ended up in Hassan’s and Ali’s leaving. It was angering to imagine Assef taking drinks from a platter Hassan was holding because one could only imagine how much that moment hurt Hassan and how much anger and aggression he must have held back towards the boy that raped him. This part of the book also increased immensely my dislike for the immature and coward Amir who, being selfish as always, wanted to get rid of Hassan just to make himself feel better and to try to ease the uneasiness of the guilt he felt for standing back and watching while Assef did what he wished with Hassan. It was also frustrating to read how Hassan and Ali just took Amir’s indecencies and on top of Hassan accepting the lie that he stole the watch and the money, neither Hassan nor Ali told Baba the truth about Amir even though they both knew everything.

On top of that, the life Baba worked so hard to build for himself and for Amir, all his friends, everything he knows and loves, taken from him by the Russians who took over his beloved Kabul. The hardships they had to go through to get out alive, the people they saw die right before them like Kamal and his father, and the fear of getting caught at any minute and being murdered by the Russian soldiers. So much empathy was felt for Baba because not only does he have an unworthy son to his morals and strong will, but he has to leave everything he knows behind, leaving only with the dirt he put in his little container to remind him of what he loved. Baba is a character I really look up to because he is just so respectable and unselfish. Leaving to the United Sates for Amir’s benefit is just one example. Time has taken its toll on Baba though and it seems that the duty of taking care of the family has befallen on Amir, and he seems to be doing a good job in understanding that his father has given all he can to bring them here to start their new life and he isn’t the same able man he was back in Afghanistan and now needs Amir to take care of him. 

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