Quarter 4: Week 3, Post B

Dear Mariam,

Wow. As I continue to read A Thousand Splendid Sons and learn more about you and your life, I become more and more appalled! Your situation seems awful. First, you're forced to marry a complete stranger so your father can save face. Then, this man turns out to be a total control freak--he makes you wear a burqa, he doesn't allow you to talk to certain people, and he gets angry at YOU when you have miscarriages. It's not your fault! You shouldn't have to take the blame for something that you feel terrible enough about as it is.

He has no right to treat you the way he does. He talks down to you, if at all, and he complains about everything. You work so hard to keep the house to his liking and to cook meals that he'll find satisfactory, but he always finds something wrong with what you've made. It's just not fair! The real kicker was when he forced you to eat pebbles-that is just inhumane! Pebbles are obviously not meant to be chewed with human teeth, but he made you do just that! You lost two molars and all because he thought your rice wasn't soft enough?! If I was you, I would have left his sorry butt months ago!

But the sad thing is, you can't. You have nowhere else to go. The fact that living with this abusive man is your best option does not say a lot. I feel so sorry for you! I really hope you can stay optimistic even though it must be so tough to deal with your situation right now. Try to remember that you're so much stronger than him-he is weak.

In hopes that things improve soon,
A-Rod

Quarter 4: Week 3, Post A

My reading this week of A Thousand Splendid Suns revealed many cultural differences. First of all, the fact that Mariam and Rasheed sleep in separate rooms was strange to me. I'm sure there are similar cases in the U.S. in some places, but for me this is really weird! I've always known marriage to be between two people who love each other enough to spend the rest of their lives together, which usually means spending a lot of time together. I do not know of any married couples who sleep in different rooms, it seems to defeat the whole purpose of marriage-togetherness. But in Kabul, Afghanistan, this is a very common practice. In fact, Mariam is relieved that she gets to sleep alone and the arrangement seems to please Rasheed as well. Strange as it seems to me, this is the norm for couples with arranged marriages in Afghanistan.

Another cultural difference I've noticed is the life of Mariam as a housewife. She is held to very high expectations by Rasheed. For example, she is expected to have dinner hot and ready to eat every day when Rasheed comes home from work so he can eat. She also is expected to keep the house clean and tidy all the time. Furthermore, when Rasheed wants to host friends, Mariam is expected to clean, cook, and set up the house for them but then spend the night in her room, out of sight. And the most surprising part about this is that Mariam actually enjoys this! She likes the fact that Rasheed wants to hide her from his friends-to her, it shows that he's proud of her. If that were me, I would be seriously angry! To do all that work and then be forced to hide out in my room and miss out on all the fun? No way! It just goes to show how extremely different Afghan society is from ours.

World Issues

For our world issues outline/annotated bibliography assignment, I've decided to focus on the terrible situation in Darfur in Africa. (And I'm not just copying the model, I actually really do want to learn more about this issue-it's something that really interests me.) Here are some sources that seem helpful so far:

"Dying in Darfur: Can the Ethnic Cleansing in Sudan Be Stopped?" from New Yorker, accessed on SIRS
http://sks.sirs.com/cgi-bin/hst-article-display?id=SMN0307-0-2161&artno=0000193365&type=ART&shfilter=U&key=darfur&title=Dying%20in%20Darfur&res=Y&ren=Y&gov=Y&lnk=N&ic=Y

"Darfur and the Genocide Debate" from Foreign Affairs, accessed on SIRS
http://sks.sirs.com/cgi-bin/hst-article-display?id=SMN0307H-0-6022&artno=0000209215&type=ART&shfilter=U&key=darfur%20conflict&title=Darfur%20and%20the%20Genocide%20Debate&res=Y&ren=Y&gov=Y&lnk=N&ic=Y

"UN Says Darfur Conflict Worsening, with perhaps 300,000 Dead" from The New York Times online
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-UN-Sudan-Darfur.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=darfur&st=nyt&oref=slogin

Quarter 4: Week 2, Post B

So far I am really, really enjoying A Thousand Splendid Suns-much more than I thought I would. I mean, I've heard how amazing The Kite Runner is, and this is by the same author, but I definitely didn't expect to like it as much as I do. Mariam is easy to relate to in some ways because she's around the same age as me, she doesn't always get along with her mom, and she and her dad have a special bond-at least at first. However, in most ways our lives are very different. Mariam's parents are not married, she doesn't know any of her siblings (or half-siblings, technically) and her mother kills herself when Mariam is just fifteen years old. Also, she is forced into an arranged marriage and she is an outcast in her father's home. In these ways, her life is so vastly different from mine, it's hard to believe. She has so much struggle at such a young age, and many of these struggles are things that would never be encountered by the average American teen (aka the arranged marriage and dealing with her father's multiple wives). Overall, I really like Mariam so far. I think she's smart and very strong. Hopefully she can learn to stand up for herself a little more-she needs a little Minerva Mirabal attitude in her! I can't wait to keep reading and see what happens when Mariam gets married to Rasheed..should be interesting!

Quarter 4: Week 2, Post A

I switched books this week to A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini because there weren't very many cultural differences to blog about in Atonement. I'm going to keep reading it, just not for our outside reading assignment.

Anyway...there is definitely an abundance of cultural differences to be found in this book! Within the first few pages I immediately noticed how many aspects of Mariam's life are strange to me. It's crazy to think how incredibly different her life is from mine, when she's just a teenage girl like me. For example, Mariam's father, Jalil, has three wives with ten children between them. Obviously, this would be seen as completely crazy and just wrong in our modern American culture, but it's seen as totally normal in Mariam's home of Afghanistan.

Another prominent example of culture difference is Mariam's arranged marriage to Rasheed. "Mariam's multiple step-mothers inform her that she has a "suitor" and even though she doesn't want to be married, her father has already agreed and she must honor that. She is only fifteen years old-something that would never happen in the U.S., but is seen as acceptable in Afghanistan. 'What are you, fifteen? That's a good, solid marrying age for a girl' (44). And arranged marriages are very uncommon in America as well, although they do still exist in some areas.

The last major cultural difference I found this week was Mariam's lack of familiarization with material goods. For instance, she sees a car for the very first time in her entire life when she is fifteen years old! "Mariam had never before touched a car. She ran her fingers along the hood of Jalil's car, which was black, shiny, with glittering wheels...the seats were made of white leather" (30). Cars are just one of many things that Mariam has never seen or used-things we take for granted in our daily lives.

Quarter 4: Week 1, Post B

Dear Briony,

So far, I am not that impressed by you in this story. You do seem very intelligent, and based on the snippets from your play, you're definitely a gifted writer. I think it's impressive how you've tried so hard to follow your dreams by writing so many stories and plays. It's nice that you have the support of your family to back you up as well.

However, I really think you're being kind of immature about this whole casting situation with Lola. Even though she sort of took over your territory by taking the lead role in your summer play, you could be handling the issue with much more grace than you currently are. Especially given Lola's current situation--her mother has abandoned her and she has just been sent to live in a totally new home with family she doesn't know that well. That's got to be a pretty scary change for a teenage girl to be forced into, especially with the added anxiety about the war raging in her hometown. I advise you to take some pity on the girl and befriend her. Even though she seems uppity and annoying right now, deep down she's probably feeling very scared and alone.

Also, even though Lily's twin brothers seem pretty bothersome since they're ruining your play with their terrible acting, you should have more patience with them. Again, they're stuck in a very difficult situation right now. And frankly, I think you should consider it a victory that you even convinced them to be in your play in the first place. Giving them acting tips is probably not the best idea right now.

Anyway, I hope you start to grow up a little bit more as the story continues because right now you strike me as almost whiny at some parts. Sorry for the negativity, but I'm just trying to be honest here.

Sincerely,
Anna

Quarter 4: Week 1, Post A

This week it was fairly difficult to find cultural differences in Atonement. Since the book takes place in England, the culture is very similar to here in America. Also, the plot is still in the beginning stages. However, there was one difference that stood out to me in my reading this week, which is the great importance of family. In the beginning of the book, Briony's family has just taken in her three cousins, the daughters of her mother's sister. They take them in because their home had become somewhat of a war zone and their mother fled. Their father feels the children would be safer with the Tallis family. And the Tallises were more than happy to help out: "...the house could easily absorb three children and the Quinceys could stay as long as they liked..." (8). This willingness to do nearly anything to help one's family is less common here in the U.S. It is much more unusual to find extended families living together in one household. Perhaps this is because the United States is not a war zone, but I think it goes beyond that because I've noticed this difference in other cultures as well. My dad's family is from Spain and two of his aunts and their children have lived together in the same home since they arrived here many years ago. Since one of his aunts is widowed, it is simply expected that her sister and her sister's husband will welcome them into their home. This is much the same as with Briony's family being expected to welcome the Quincey girls into their home when their mother abandons them.

Quarter 4: Explanation

For quarter 4, I chose to read Atonement by Ian McEwan. I made this pick for a few different reasons. First of all, Ian McEwan is an award-winning author which leads me to believe that this book will be a quality read. But this is not the main reason I chose this book. I was most attracted to it because of the film adaptation that was recently released, featuring Keira Knightley. The movie won an Oscar and was nominated for countless other awards and honors. I talked to a few adults who had seen it and they were full of positive reviews for the film. So, when I heard about the foreign authors requirement, I immediately thought of this book. Ian McEwan is from Britain, which is the setting of the book. Also, the story is set during World War II, which will provide for some major cultural differences from our modern life here in Edina. I can't wait to read this book; hopefully I will enjoy it enough to go see the movie when i finish it!