Kite Runner Seminar Reflection #2

The seminar deepened my understanding of Hassan's respect. One thing said was that the fact that Hassan lived in the servant house despite Amir no longer living in the main house shows Hassan's infinite respect. I thought about this more in depth and realized how truly incredible Hassan is.

The statement that I agree with the most was that moving to America strengthened Baba and Amir's relationship. Being in smaller spaces and the lack of a high position for Baba allowed him to see Amir at eye level. The statement that I agree the least with is that Baba and Amir are cowards for "abandoning" their country in a time of disaster. I rebutted by saying that no one would call me a coward if I decided to leave DC because it was being bombed, and I stand by that claim. There wasn't anything that I can think of that I wish was said that wasn't. In fact, I remember that on many occasions there were things I was about to say when someone took the words right out of my mouth.

What worked very well was that the seminar never got out of hand. We were the dominator group, so we were expected to be screaming over each other like 3rd period. However, as it turns out, we were very respectful and everyone got to talk when they wanted to and no one dominated due to the collection of all dominators.

The only thing we could improve is spending too much time on one topic. Since we were all dominators, we all had lots of things to say, and therefore we would spend endless amounts of time on one topic because everyone had something to say.

Kite Runner Seminar Reflection #1

The seminar influenced my understanding of the friendship between Amir And Hassan. I now understand Amir’s conflict of being friends with Hassan, but being ashamed of him at the same time due to his status. One specific thing said that deepened my thinking was that Hassan might only have this great respect for Amir due to his social superiority, an idea that I’m unsure whether or not I agree with. 

The statement from a peer that I agree with the most was that Baba doesn’t believe that Amir is worth the death of his wife. We constantly see Baba being disappointed with his son’s life choices, and I believe he wouldn’t care as much if Amir’s birth hadn’t killed his wife. I least agreed with the idea that Hassan’s mother was a terrible person for leaving. She was forced into an arranged marriage to a man with physical disabilities, she can’t be fully blamed for leaving. However, this isn’t an opinion that I was able to fully vocalize, and I wish I were able to have said this because the discussion continued in a direction I didn’t agree with.

Almost everyone seemed to have understood the material very well and this led to a very deep and intellectual conversation. We were also finally able to establish emotional appeals in our conversation. 

I still think many people are too shy to talk… we have a few dominators that make their points and a few kids that have things to say but they don’t. The idea of splitting up the dominators from the less vocal kids is one I support.