Wednesday, April 30, 2014

What is the summary for Chapter 16 of The Kite Runner?

Rahim Khan begins by describing to Amir his desolate life in Kabul under Russian rule. He was growing old and finding it difficult to maintian Baba's large house all by himself. After Baba's death he was so overwhelmed by loneliness that he  decided to take Hassan into the house. He managed to find Hassan who was living in a village outside Bamiyan. Hassan was married and his wife, Farzana Jan, was expecting.  Hassan is saddened to hear from him that Ali had been killed by a land mine. Rahim Khan enjoys the meal cooked for him by Farzana and stays overnight. When Rahim Khan first asks Hassan to come with him to Kabul Hassan refuses saying he has settled down to a peaceful life in the village, but however the next morning he and his wife agree to come to Kabul. Hassan asks Rahim Kham many questions about Amir, and he answers him to the best of his knowledge. When Hassan hears about Baba's death he is grief stricken and cries his heart out.

When they arrive at Kabul, Hassan refuses to stay in the house saying it was a matter "ihtiram, a matter of respect,"  and moves in with his wife into the very same hut in the backyard where he was born. Hassan, then, mourned Baba's death by wearing black for forty days.

Hassan and his wife look after the house with great care as though they were expecting Amir to arrive from America any moment. Farzana gives birth to a still born girl child and is heartbroken. However, in early 1990, she becomes pregnant again. In the summer of that year Sanaubar, Hassan's mother makes a sudden appearance. She was once very attractive but now she is scarred beyond recognition, the victim of a brutal knife attack.She had eloped with a band of travelling singers and dancers in 1964 soon after giving birth to Hassan,without even holding him. Sanaubar is gradually nursed back to health and in course of time Hassan forgives her and is reconciled to her. In the winter of 1990 Sanaubar delivers Hassan's son, Sohrab.  She and her grandson became very fond of one another: "the two of them were inseaparable." When Sohrab was four years old, Sanaubar died in her sleep.

In due course Hassan taught his son Sohrab, to be a kite runner. The Taliban,however, banned kite fighting shortly after taking power in 1996.  The Taliban fighters indulged in ethnic cleansing and massacred the Hazaras in Mazar-i-Sharif.

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