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Hassan's gift
Every year Baba honors Hassan with an extraordinary gift for his birthday. This year Baba brings Hassan a plastic surgeon who can people's faces, Hassan's "hand touched his upper lip. 'oh' he said again" (hosseini 46). This event demonstrates how much Hassan means to Baba, and also increases the jealousy Amir already feels towards Baba's attention and affection towards Hassan. -
The Kite Challenge
On the day of the Kite tournament, Hassan shares his previous dream to Amir, explaining ho they were going to win. He reminds Amir when he was about to back down that "there's no monster, just a beautiful day" (Hosseini 61). The Kite tournament is significant because this event clarifies who the Kite Runner is mainly about, how Amir finally made Baba proud, and this is when hassan's character takes a great turn when he is raped by Assef. -
Birthday Goodbye
After no longer being able to feel the guilt of his cowardness, after his grand birthday party, Amir lies to Baba and tells him that Hassan stole his new watch. Being loyal as he always was, Hassan never denies it, " 'yes' " (hosseini 105). He confessed too a crime he never comitted. In this event, a power shift occurs between Baba and Ali where Baba's status dropped, and he becomes a man who lost the brother he never treated as his equal due to society. -
Invasion
First Soviet Troops entered Kabul on December 27 1979, "to assist Babrak Karmal, who had become president in a coup within the Afghan Communist Leaddership" ("Aghanistan- An Overview). -
Cancer
When first moving to America, Baba continues to try to hold a high status in society and trying to make his own money and rebuild his name in the new country, but Amir soon finds out that " living in America gave gim an ulcer" (Hosseini 125). In order to survive Baba works a life risking job which gives him cancer. But he demonstrates his strength through his stuborness when he objects to Amir to work. He says that Amir will only continue on with his eduction for his future. -
The Russian Invasion
Once the Russians attack and officially control, many Afghanistans flea, including Baba and Amir, to America. People were runnig because, " you couldn't trust anyone in Kabul anymore- for a fee or under threat, people told on each other" (Hosseini 112). The Russians causes the plot setting to change in order for Baba and Amir to survive. But it also provides an example of how fast any power can change and how easy trust will dissolve just for the hope of being able to live the next day. -
A New Life
After moving to America, many events take place during Baba and Amir's attempts to adapt to their new life. At the age of 20, Amir graduates from high school, succeeding in making Baba proud. Baba throws a huge party with strangers for Amir, he told him," 'I am moftakhir(proud) Amir' " (Hosseini 131). Amir's character is encouraged after finally being able to make Baba proud in his own way, not a way Baba would have tried to do. -
Prospereing
When Baba finds out about his cancer, he denies treatment. Instead Baba and Amir begin to work at the flea market, but Baba's health is already beginning to weaken. The significance of the flea market is that Amir meets Soraya, who his heart " stuttered at the thought of her" (Hosseini 142). This is Amir's first time to have feelings for a girl, and this forshadows how an important event will occur in the plot between the two. -
Happiness and Death
After almost a year of properly "courting" Soraya, Amir ask Baba to propose to the General in hand of Soraya. When Amir first asks Baba to do this, " Baba's dry lips stretched into a smile. A spot of green on a wilted leaf" (Hosseini 161). This enlightens Baba and becomes one of the few things that Baba is proud of Amir for. This is also one of the rare moments where Baba and Amir seem to be on the same page cultrally, and socially. -
USA interference
In 1986, the Soviet Air Force was hit by "stinger antiaircraft missils supplied by the united States to the rebels" ("Afghanistan- An Overview"). -
Happiness and Death part 2
Soraya moves in with Amir and Baba to help care for Baba. After one dinner Amir walks in on Soraya readin one of his stories to Baba. That night when Soraya offers Baba him his morphine Baba says, " 'there is no pain tonight.' We closed the door. baba never woke up" (Hosseini 173). When Baba listens to Amir's stories the reader gets a sense of understandin on Baba's part. That he has come to accept the man Amir has grown to be, and can peacefully rest knowing this. -
Memories Resurface
After Baba's death, Rahim Khan contacts Amir, telling him he needs to come to Afghanistan. That evening Amir takes a walk alone, reliving all his childhood nightmares and mistakes. Amir has a feeling he knows what Rahim Kahn wants him for and he is afraid. he doesn't want to face the mistakes he knew h wasn't man enough to stand up to nor admit. -
Freedom From Soviet Union
After a few more attacks from the rebels and, "peace talks moderated by the United Nations, the last Soviet troops left Afghanistan" (Afghanistan- An Overview). -
Atonement
In Afghanistan we later learn through Rahim Khan that Hassan's mother, Sanubar, who did not at first even want Hassan returns seeking his forgiveness. She gives her grandson the care and atttention she should've given Hassan as a baby. During her last few years staying with Hassan and his family, Sanubar and Hassan are able to build the relationship that never existed between them. This reveales how broken Sanubar's character was til to the point where she was had the chance of forgiveness. -
Civil War for Control
Once the last of Soviet Union troops left, "[A]fghanistan descended into vicious internecine stife; power was anarchically divided among competing warlords and individual fiefdoms" ("Afghanistan- An Overview"). -
The Taliban
In 1994, one exponentially growing in size and power group was the Taliban led by Mullah Omar and his men. This group got " [P]akistani intelligence officers began funneling arms, money and suppliees as well as military advisors to help guide them in battle" ("Afghanistan- An Overview"). -
Taliban Win the War
By 1996 the Taliban had taken control of Afghanistan, "imposing strict enforcement of fundamentalist Islamic law, banning movies and music and forcing women out of schools and into all- envoloping burqa clothing" ("Afghanistan- An Overview"). -
The Taliban's destruction 1996-98
When the Taliban take over the mass murders of Hazara deaths begin. Hassan and his wife being part of it. But Hassan had died a loyal death, as loyal and honest as he always was. Him and his wife were shot by the Taliban, who were claiming to be cleaning Afghanistan, by taking out the Hazaras. Hassan's son however, was taken in by an orphanage, but is later taken a Taliban soldier. -
9/11 Attacks
After Al Qaeda's "(a)ttack on the World Trade Center in New York on September 11, 2001, Bush gave the Taliban an ultimatum to hand over Osama Bin Laden" ( "Afghanistan- An Overview). -
Part 2 Amir's Search of Sohrab
Once Amir finds Sohrab he is willing to pay the Taliban soldier any amount, but that changes when he learns who that soldier is, " 'his name escaped my lips: Assef' "(Hosseini 281). Amir takes the chance to atone fo own sins, like Sanubar, by saving a life he could and this time he was not going to back down and fail. His action shows the diff b/w him and Baba, they way they choose to atone for their sins. -
Return one last time home
Another time Rahim Khan contacts Amir, he asks him to come to Pakistan. Amir knowing very well that this is very imrtant to his past and possibly the last wish Rahim Khan will ask him obeys. Amir there learn about Hassan's life and death, his son, and the truth of how they are half brothers. Rahim Khan's last wish is for Amir to find Sohrab, HAssan''s son, and bring him to safety. Amir succeeds in finding him, but he meets an enemy from his past that makes him feel like a coward all over again. -
USA Hits Back
When the Taliban wouldn't hand over Osama Bin Laden, "the United States joined forces with rebel groups that had never accepted Taliban rule" ("Afghanistan- An Overview"). They were able to drive the groups Al Qaeda and Taliban to the PAkistan border. -
Just getting by
Amir succeeds in saving Sohrab, but when he explains that Sohrab that he may need to leave for America alone, Sohrab tries to commit suicide but is brought to the hospital just in time. After this event Sohrab completely shuts the world out, even after he moves to America with Amir. Soraya is sad that he isn't open with her, but she stays patient. However, Amir takes full responsiblitliy which portrays how much Amir's character has changed throughout the novel. -
Reform
After a whole year, Sohrab is still a very distant child. During the summer, Afghinstans gather for a Kite tournament reminding them of home. Amir asks Sohrab if he wants to be his partner. This sparks the first light in his eyes. Amir was help Sohrab to be the last kit in the air, a winner of his own kind. As the last kite is cut, Amir ask Sohrab if he wants him to run and get it for him. Timidly he nodds, and Amir taking the oppertunity of comunication replys, " For you a Thousand times over" -
The Karzai Governement
Hamid Karzai became the chairman of an interim gov, making him leader of the country. he said he hoped to "[s]ecure peace, and win the country's much- needed international aid. he was elected to a 5 year term as president in 2004. but he soon was blamed for the lack of ecom=nomic progress and corrupt officials. -
Obama's Military Decision.
In his speech Presidant Obama "[a]nnounced his plan to deploy 30,000 additional troops. vowing to bring American forces home from Afghanistan in middle of 2011, that US should not have an open- ended commitment" ("Afghanistan- An Overview"). he later moved the date to 2014, assuming they will be successful by then.
