Blog 3

For this week, we were assigned the novel Drown by Junot Diaz. I absolutely loved reading this novel. I have taken Spanish courses since my freshman year in high school and through my junior year here at USD (received my minor in Spanish education). So, when I started reading the novel and figured out the the author intertwined a varitey of Spanish vocabulary and slang words, I was excited! I love reading novels that can provide a perspective from someone in a different culture/SES status/ethnicity/etc. because it provides a genuine outlook from that person/culture's viewpoint. The book starts out by introducting the 2 main characters that we, as readers, follow through the entire novel. Yunior and Rafa are brothers living with their Mama and Papi. After a while, we find out that originally, their father had left for the States and for the longest time, kept a lie going that he was going to return home soon to them and their Mama. We find out that when he is around, he is rather violent and always has something to complain about. He also is cheating on his wife with the "Puerto Rican woman". What blew me away by this aspect of the story was that he actually took his kids with him when he visited his mistress- like it was no big deal at all. We also meet a character names Ysreal in the first section of the novel. Meeting this character made me really sad. Finding out what had happened to him when he was only a child and then all of the ridicule and fun-making he has to go through with the local kids is absolutely unnerving. Rafa and Yunior end up picking on him and eventually tearing the maks that he wears off of his face- they got what they wanted (to see his disfigurement), but they'll have to live with what they did for the rest of their lives.
After this, we move through the novel and travel with the family to their Tio and Tia's house. This was also an interesting section, with the very different atmosphere in that home as well as the scene where Yunior gets carsick and how his father responds. Apparently, the smell of the new upholstery in his dad's Volkswagon makes Yunior sick and at least 3 times now, he has thrown up all over the car and his father has been the one to clean it up. So I can just imagine how scared Yunior must have been to take a ride with his family to visit his aunt and uncle. I also thought it humorous that Yunior's mother offered the equivalent of Tums to a saint before the road trip :) What a pleasant offering. Once we arrive at the aunt and uncles house, we see again how violent and awkward Yunior and Rafa's father can make things. Everyone is getting food, dancing, laughing and having a good time. Then when Yunior tries to get more food, his father yells at him, telling him that he is not allowed to eat anymore. His mother tries to intervene, but his father won't have it.
In the next section we get to meet Yunior's "girlfriend" Aurora. Not many of Yunior's friends are a fan of her, but that can be expected when you end up finding out that she's a crackhead. This section of the novel was very interesting to read- seeing how in different cultures and different environments can provoke different intimate relationship interactions. Yunior seemed to treat his girlfriend like crap, yet at the same time, he wanted nothing more than to be with her. She seems to just take the verbal abuse, but at the same time, doesn't seem to see Yunior on an exclusive level- she does what she wants, when she wants, but comes back to him when she wants sex or a pack of smokes. I also enjoyed that the author took an entire chapter to discuss and explore different relationships with different girls: "How to Date a Browngirl, Blackgirl, Whitegirl, or Halfie". Just to see how there are different labels for girls and relationships seems odd, maybe a little different to me- and the fact that apparently, these girls have no qualms with the labels or how relationships run- different culture, different world.