Valet Reader

The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid

San Francisco is supposed to be a cultural hotbed right? A place where you can be who you are and not have to worry about what the people around you think. In case you didn’t know it, this is not Bible Belt country. For the past couple days I’ve been going outside for my walk around break from work and have seen something that I had not noticed before, four gentlemen facing East towards Mecca and praying. I don’t claim to be a religious know-it-all, in fact I don’t know shit. Regardless, I took it in for what it was, these guys doing what they do, no big deal; it actually looked incredibly peaceful and serene. What startled me was the way that some people gawked at them. Some, like me, were able to notice it and just keep moving along. While others stared and stared and stared and stared. The last time I saw these guys, there was a group of adult Asian women who seemed shocked to see these gentlemen praying that they were sneaking around, crouching behind planters and pillars to get a better look at what they were doing. I got kind of disgusted seeing that, I can’t really explain why but I just did. Maybe these women saw the shoe on the other foot seeing as they probably get giggled at while doing tai chi in Washington Square Park or perhaps they are just ignorant.

Incidentally this whole experience got me thinking about a book I had seen previously at Browser’s Books on Fillmore, “The Reluctant Fundamentalist.”

I gotta say this book was not what I expected it to be… I pretty much feel as though by writing about people being ignorant and prejudiced just makes me prejudiced. But for the most part this book had nothing to do with prejudice, which startled me.

The perspective of the story was pretty interesting, although I thought there was an element of Yoda in the way the author wrote/spoke. Part love story, part coming of age and part I really don’t have a damn clue. I guess in the end if you’ve got a few spare hours and want some philosophical babble about a Pakistani trying to make it in the US post 9/11 then pick this up and read it. I zipped through it in less than a day and I don’t regret reading it, but had it taken me another day… well, that’s another story.

One thing I will say is that at the end of the book there are a list of questions that are supposed to make you “think” about what you’ve just read. I realize that many people use these questions in book clubs (look out, hopefully a valet book club is coming soon) and class discussions but I like to see what sort of questions readers can come up with themselves as opposed to some over zealous lit. graduate student. Nevertheless, I thought about trying to answer them, actually looked at a few, and really had no idea what they were asking or how someone like me would begin to try and answer them. To provide some insight into what I’m talking about (this may become a recurring thing on this blog so bear with me) I’ve provided an example followed by my response.

Question: “Who is Jim and why does he take such a liking to Changez? What do they have in common?”

Answer: Jim is a man, so is Changez. I take it that they both have male genitalia, they have that in common. Jim and Changez work at the same place, they have that in common.

Well, that just about answers that one. Obviously I’m missing some big grand point Hamid is trying to make about these two characters but really, do I care? Nope.