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Chen's journey to get permission to go to America is surely full of challenges. The government has been playing the game of pass and it does no help to Chen. Bureaucracy in China has still not diminished. In fact, jealousy of some people (the dean) tries to keep the talented people like Chen from getting further education. However, I feel happy for Chen that he got the chance to go to America.

Despite the fact that Chen is a hardworking student, government in China chooses to give other people who seems to be more "loyal" to them the opportunity to go abroad. Chen is surely not experienced enough for this situation. Working hard and getting good grades does not work in China. Even though people who choose to join the communist seem to be "loyal", all they want is to go abroad. What a sarcasm!

Not only Chen is being influenced by the foreigner's open minds, his parents are also enlightened. The fact that Chen's parents refuse to take any money for their daughters' marriage shocked me! In the past, the grooms had to pay their bride's parents money in order to marry them. Nowadays, China still keeps this tradition that seems to treat daughters as objects that can be sold for money.

This books describes the real life of that period of time in China. In fact, it exposes some of the interesting social habits in China. People in the old age tend to assume that as a college student, Chen must act gentle and walk with his hands on the back. However, time has changed. Although Chen and his cousin are both college students, they are different. Chen is less restrained by the traditional thinking.

Even though Chen's life inn Beijing has been open to foreign world, his hometown Yellow Stone isn't quite there. When Chen went back to his hometown, his dream of America cannot be announced. There were even wired broadcast in every single person's house just to advertise the greatness of China. By changing the lyrics of the song to, "I'm West needs rest", we can see Chen's loath to China.

Although the part Chen argued with the guard at the Friendship store was funny, it reveals the corruption of the Chinese government. The ignorance of the guard was a normal occasion in that period of time. Foreigners had privilege over Chinese. The levels of classes made people who are considered as refugees unable to enter the Friendship stores. The old corrupted China has not gone yet.

Chen's life has been successful. In fact, one of the few skills he brought from Yellow Stone helped him a lot. He made friends with foreigners because of his ability to play a bamboo flute. The country who hardly knew how to speak English now could be a part of their community. Chen's effort paid off. I could see Chen has a bright future in front of him.

Chen's conversation with his dean changed my opinion of the university. At first, from his roommates descriptions, Beijing Language Institute is a very inclusive school and people have lots of freedom here. However, the dean's words surprised me. The fact that this school did not encourage Chen to study as much English as possible made me understand why this book is forbidden in China.

As one of the fewer country boys studying at Beijing Language Institute, Da Chen has not seen many of the things in the city. Everything seemed brand new to him. People has been scolding on his appearance, and accent. However, he has not given up his American dream, especially from the professor he met that had similar experience with him.

It is not surprising for me to see Aubrey move out. However, the mothers in the church are still wondering why Nadia is acting weird. This all came from the exposure of a secret that has been kept since Luke and Nadia's childhood. Although Nadia and Luke has been apologizing, Aubrey did not accept it. However, she still loves Luke since she went home even she knew Luke would be home.

I am surprised that Russell came back for Aubrey. She surely struggled whether she should meet Russell. She does not want to cheat to her husband but does she really love Luke? She still felt uncomfortable while Luke touched her, but didn't when she was kissing with Russell. Although their marriage seems so perfect, they never loved each other as much. Russell's return triggered the conflict between Aubrey and Luke.

The injury of Nadia's father was shocking, but it also served as a turning point for Nadia. She flew back from the new life she has right now for his father even though they were in such bad relationships. Her love for her father is never gone. However, going back to California also brought back old memories. She realized that her love for Luke was never away, and they started to "date" again, which is unacceptable.

The fact that Nadia and Aubrey are messing around with the marines surprised me. Aubrey has stepped out of her comfort zone and has done something that she was never courageous enough to do- get together with a stranger. Even though it is only a few days before her wedding, she managed to do so. It marks that after the marriage, she would not be able to be so close to a stranger again.

Nadia has experienced change when she went to Michigan for university, so do Luke. Luke has joined a football team and started to do what he used to love. However, it did not go as well. His relationship with Nadia has not made him mature. He is still not aware of the responsibility that he should shoulder and the more severe injury finally woke him up. The time at the Cobras serves as a turning point of his life.

Nadia meets a girl called Aubrey from church. She is a completely different person from Nadia that she does not mess around with other boys and is very sincere to church. However, they get o become very good friends because of the difference they have. There are certainly similarities among them. They both had a bad experience that they are embarrassed to share with each other and it is understandable

The mothers in the Upper Room reacted to Elise's death in a way that I could have never imagined. As an outsider, what the mothers did is unacceptable. They blamed Elise for her own action by stating that: "How dare she opt for a death." However, the fact that they were laughing at Elise the other day indirectly caused her to commit suicide. They do not care for other people though they showed their grief outside.

Luke's father, John offered Nadia a job at the Upper Room after he found out about the unwanted pregnancy. I am glad that the Sheppards paid her back for Luke's actions. However, as the leader of a christian chapel, I can't believe how easily it was for a family to come to a decision of killing a baby. The author puts many social crisis people now a facing into the story for us to contemplate.

It is unfortunate to hear that Nadia got pregnant. However, what made me more shocked is that Luke, the man who should have been responsible for Nadia's pregnancy did not even come to pick her up after the abortion. The author's depiction of Nadia warns us to be careful about our relationships with other. It also reminds us of the fact that unwanted pregnancy is a big issue right now amount teenagers.

On page 172, Changez mentioned that when he returned to Pakistan, his love for Erica and America went with him. I think this relates to the book cover a lot. The cover is Changez standing on the window, and watching New York far away from him. He also had a rose in his hands, which indicated his love for Erica followed him back to Pakistan, and although he is back to Pakistan, he could not forget about New York.

The story about the janissaries told by Juan-Bautista is shocking. I finally understood what kind of a person is Changez described as. The janissaries were captured by the Ottomans at a young age and were brainwashed, so they were used to fight in wars. Changez came to America in college and worked for an American firm. In others eyes, he is still a foreigner and were treated unequally.

I feel bad for Changez. HIs relationship with Erica is surely a pity. The last time they met, Erica is in a very bad condition and Changez did not have the courage to tell Erica that she can forget about Chris. If he had shouted out his true thoughts and not to be a fundamentalist, which is to follow what Erica wanted the relation to go, he might be able to continue with the relationships and not perform bad in work.

On page 109, After Erica disappearing for a few days again, she surprisingly offered Changez to come over to her home. What happened next really shocked me. Her mother talked to Changez about their relationships and denied the fact that Erica should be Changez's boyfriend. After 9/11, everything seemed to be going toward the direction that is not good for Changez, and I am curious to see what will happen next.

On page 98, I felt it was interesting that the word fundamental is mentioned in the story again. This time, it is from Changez's boss. He told Changez to focus on the fundamentals. This is also italicized. Jim, as a boss in an american company, is telling Changez to just focus on what his work is, which he certainly wasn't. This reflects the title, and also incurs what the american companies are doing to the workers.

On page 93, Changez stated that the power of his bnlinders shocks him, which certainly serves as a turning point of the story to me, since everything seemed to be on the right track before this page. However, there are certainly insinuations of this turning point earlier in the story. The author mentioned 9/11, which has to have something to do with Changez. I am wondering why he smiled when he saw the news of 9/11.

On page 42, Changez and another 3 people went on a limousine including Jim. They were chatting, but only Changez and Jim was observing the others. The author started writing dialogues, which is a total different style of writing then before. This marks that Jim's occurrence is important to Changez, which can be supported since how observant Changez was showed the severe competition between the coworkers for the job.

On page 34, Changez expressed how amazing this country is. In fact, this is truly what most foreigners see the country as. In their eyes, America is the land of opportunities, prosperity and competition. The first few days Changez reported at Underwood Sampson clearly showed this. The credit card given to Changez that he could use freely for business purposes gave him a total different idea of a company.

I was surprised by how the author wrote this book. It is almost like the character Changez is talking directly to me, which makes me a part of the book. This fascinates me a lot since I feel like I am engaged into the story and encouraged me to keep on reading the book.

At the end of epilogy, Wes has already done one cancer surgery, which relates to the prologue where David says Wes dies out of concert. I think this is a very magnificent idea because Wes dying painfully shows his decision at first toward Frank's incident. When Wes is asked to talk about what happened. He refused because of his love toward Montana.

Frank committed suicide. I found out this very suddenly but I can understand Frank that he is very embarrassed of what he did. At the end of Part 3, David stated the benefits of Frank's death but also some of the bad ways. All of a sudden, David has lost a family member of him. Also, this proves that he has grown up. He is not a child who only thinks of good and bad but can tell both sides of an incident.