Does the Kite runner compare?

i know its highly known but how many of you saw the kite runner and were utterly dissapointed with the movie? i know i was. very dissapointed. the movie completely left out various important plot details. hassans mom was left out of it, so was the suicude scene which in my opinion should have been included. i probably would have liked it or enjoyed the movie if i hadnt read the book but since i read it, then i cought all of the deviations and i just couldnt be ok with it. how many of you have loved a book and hated the movie? shouldnt the directors be able to get it by now?

Memoir: Discussion

After finishing my memoir for Mrs. Ross, I was left questioning if what I wrote would have any inpact on other people. Also completeing the memoir was rather difficult. It took me a while to finally decide on a memory that I would write about. The problem I faced was that I could remember a certain memory, however I had difficulty remembering the dialouge of that day or how people looked like.
This blog post was designed for students to discuss their thoughts on their memoir as well as interact with other classmates and discuss theirs.

Lurking in the Waters...

Like a sea monster, Amir drowned Hassan in the lake of blaring loyalty. Amir knew that he didn’t deserve the friendship of Hassan and was filled with shame for it. Baba performed a similar sense of betrayal to Ali. Even in the end, Baba took the secret of his treachery to the grave. According to Rahmin Khan, Baba sought redemption by indulging in philanthropy. He became a better individual because of it. However, Amir felt that “Rahim Khan had summoned me here to atone not just for my sins but for Baba’s too.” Amir’s shame brought nothing but pain; pomegranate and moving incident. What’s the correct way to atone for a sin? Do 100 million good deeds erase the one blemish?

Life of Pi

"I know zoos are no longer in people's good graces. Religion faces the same problem. Certain illusions about freedom plague them both" (Martel 14). The main character Pi in Life of Pi, is both a firm believer in zoology and religion. He is Muslim, Christian and Hindu. The book defends the common spirit between all three religions, allowing a duality between a character. It is through Pi that we see harmonious ground not only between different religions but between science and religion, proving that they can coexist together. In the quote above, Pi talks about the safety that a zoo creates for an animal, yet people find them constricting. Likewise religion is seen by people as an inhibitor of freedom and thought. Is religion constricting or like Pi claims religion is the home and hearth of humans and allows people more freedom?

Love in the 21st Century

when it comes to love we live in a generation of not revealing our true feelings because we're afraid of what they might mean. we instead exert them indirectly in menial incrimints as to maintain some sort of veil that keeps us from being exposed. It's become some sort of mass coping mechanism that has materialized a new concept of love. No longer do people give in to one another, this emerging relationship is between two strong willed individuals; this new concept has emanated because women are now more independent than ever. It seems as though romanticism is evolving

A Changed Man

Throughout, the Kite runner Amir and Hassan foil one another. Hassan is portrayed as the valiant, loyal, athletic Hazara. While Amir is the complete opposite he seems to be loyal; yet, he does not stand up for Hassan when he needs it. Also Amir is a cowered as explained throughout, the book. However, despite these differences one sees Amir towards the end starting to Mirror Hassan rather than Foil him. He goes out of his way to find Sorab and upon fighting Aseff he leaves with the boy and takes him back to America. However, Amir also gains a hair lip much like Hassan's and as he runs away he says to Sorab, "for you a thousand times over". This shows how Amir has completely changed into Hassan, he has become loyal to his son. It seems that America is their new beginning because with no class lines Amir is open to say Sorab is my nephew without persecution. Through tha, the roles between Pashtun and Hazara are reversed.

Waiting for My Time.

Have you all noticed that the themes in the novels Siddhartha, The Kite Runner, and Native Son have a connection?

Siddhartha expected to find himself immediately after he left home, to find the answers that couldn't be taught by man, but it was not until he experienced life, fully. Siddhartha had to make mistakes and fail before gaining success.


Amir, from The Kite Runner, spent his entire life in self loathe and hatred for prior mistakes in his life. Seeming to never find an escape from this personal abyss, he plants a life over it to forget the past. However, "the past claws its way out", and Amir was forced to confront it. Similar to Siddhartha, Amir found peace in the end, but only through undergoing and facing his trials.

Bigger Thomas, from Native Son, wasted his life in fear. Fear of the whites, fear failing. This confined fear caused Bigger to make irreversible mistakes and become imprisoned. Although he remained a static character, Bigger was no longer afraid; he accepted his death and became content with the person he was. Furthermore, he found his own tranquilly, able to die in peace.

It took a process for the characters to find themselves. If anything, these novels teach us to let time take it's course.

Living in America town?

"You've always been a tourist here, you just didn't know it". (Hosseini 232) In chapter 19 of The Kite Runner, Amir returns to the home he never truly knew, Afghanistan. As a child, he had lived a sheltered life away from the merciless grip of the violent streets in Afghanistan. He had never known life outside of his gated home or even the community. Amir had lived an americanized lifestyle. When the cab driver very bluntly described this to him, Amir felt irritated but knew it was the truth. He found his home unrecognizable because he had never truly lived in what Afghanistan was; a country torn up by the constant bickering between old religious clans. Despite being born in the country, Amir felt like a stranger. A person who had no right to claim Afghanistan as his home. Have you guys ever been somewhere you thought you knew but realized it wasn't at all what you remembered?

Rain drops are falling on my head...

"I was afraid I'd change my mind. I was afraid I'd deliberate, ruminate, agonize, rationalize, and talk myself into not going. I was afraid the appeal of my life in America would draw me back, that I would wade back into that great, big river and let myself forget, let the things I had learned these last few sink to the bottom. I was afraid that I'd let the waters carry me away from what I had to do. From Hassan. From the past that had come calling. And from this one last chance at redemption." (Hosseini, 2003)
I really like this quote. It embodies many of the topics which we talked about in class today. For example, the culture which Amir is ingrained in. Much like Hermann Hesse, Khaled Hosseini also embraces the imagery of water. Hosseini presents the water cycle as a change that has overtaken the character and the fact of the matter is Amir's life is a cycle in which, eastern philosophy states, what leaves, inevitably comes back--balance. However, Amir also portrays mans resistance to change: self-doubting, selfish, and restrained we subconsciously weigh the options (is the profit higher than the cost? Economic "common sense" right?). Yet blood succumbs profit.

There is also a theme of cleasing that occupies the motif of water. Has Amir's stay in America "cleansed" him of his culture?

Lets take a look at something much more close to home here--The "DREAMers". Most undocumented students, or DREAMers, have lived most, if not all, their lives in America. Their one pursuit--acceptance and embrace of who they are, not who they should be. Neither wholly American or Mexican (foreign), DREAMers live in the gray in utter limbo. These are exemplary people who are outcasts simply because they are not the warranted desire but rather foreigners in their only known home. My question here is, What defines culture and how does it affect the individual?