Chapter 21

197. As Farid and Amir drive towards the stadium, the see a dead man hanging near a restaurant as well as a beggar aiming to sell his prosthetic leg.

198. The Street Of Guests seems to be a reference to the people behind the Taliban and the somewhat nicer neighborhood, or street, they live in.

199. When Amir sees the pink house, he is reminded of the times when Baba would tell him that if he ever got lost, he should remember that they live on the street with the oink house on the end.

200. When Amir walks around his old house, he sees that its run down and gloomy. The asphalt is cracked and broken, the paint is peeling, the bricks had faded, and the driveway seems shorter than it used to be. Amir feels like a stranger.

201. Farid tells Amir, "Nothing you remember has remained. Best to forget." Amir responds by running to the old pomegranate tree and finding the carving he did with Hassan years ago. The one that said "Amir and Hassan. The sultans of Kabul."

202. The tree used to symbolize forgiveness in times of hardship, hope, and innocence. When Amir sees it now, it is wilted, lifeless, and without fruit. Now it symbolizes the change in Afghanistan, and possibly in Amir as well.

203. The Hotel Amir and Farid spend the night in doesnt have any running hot water, the toilet is cracked and  doesnt flush, the mattress is worn and accompanied by a ragged blanket, and there is a bloodstain on the wall just behind the bed.

204. Amir doesnt mind paying the cost for the room because he understands that the man he gave his money to probably has kids to feed, and he sympathizes with that.

205. The Mullah Nasruddin jokes are jokes about "the bumbling mullah" and are most likely included by the author to provide a sense of relief and possible a sense of hope for the reader.

206. Amir and Farid enter the stadium feeling sickened by what they witness. They watch during halftime as a man and woman get stoned by the Taliban for "spitting in the face of God".

207. The clerics seemed to be vicious members of the clergy. They didnt have much regret for their actions.

208. The man and woman were placed in holes in the field and buried up to their chest. As they awaited the stoning, the cleric gave a long and frightening speech about sin and punishment by order of their religion and God. They ask how one should punish an adulterer, one who dishonors the sanctity and spits in the face of God. And answers that "we shall throw stones back". The two people then take stones to the head until the Taliban can no longer hear their hearts beating. The poeple in the crowd seem shocked, gasping at each stone, and Amir states he had never wanted to leave a place so badly in his life.

209. To set a meeting with the man in the black glasses, all Farid had to do was tell someone had personal business he had to discuss with the man in white. The man he spoke to then confirmed the meeting with the man in the glasses, to which he nodded, and the meeting was set for three o'clock.


Please feel free to comment as much as you like. Id love to hear any extra input you have on the questions Ive answered.
-Summer