Cast Away and Floating Aimlessly

            Tom Hanks plays a stranded traveler in the movie “The Terminal”. This movie is based on a true story; a man’s homeland went into war while he was flying and he was stranded in an airline terminal. Everyone has been in one place or another and experienced something like this. Almost everyone moves at some point in their life. The majority of the students at Chico State have moved from their hometown to the dorms and then to an apartment or house in Chico. While attending school up here, my parents moved to Santa Barbara. Now I can say that Chico is more of a home to me than the house in Santa Barbara that I’ve spent less than one month in. Jasmine experiences these feelings of aloneness during her journey to the United States of America.

            “What country? What continent? We pass through wars, through plagues. I am hungry for news, but the discarded papers are in characters or languages I cannot read.” (Mukherjee, 101) Mukherjee begins the book with Jasmine seeing an astrologist. An astrologist follows the stars, which are constantly moving. I see this as the Author’s way of foreshadowing Jasmines life- possibly inadvertently. Jasmine ends up moving around; not just physically but mentally. “The zigzag route is the straightest.” (Mukherjee, 101) Jasmine has no control over he zigzag life, she is wandering and lost.

            Jasmine ends up in an adult situation with a man she finds repulsive. “’Second time’s the sweetest.’ He seemed to find it amusing. I turned on the shower….” (Mukherjee, 117) Mukherjee’s reference to the second time makes one think of Jasmine’s second chance at life in America. She is experiencing the smells and sounds of different worlds during her journey and acclimating herself to what life will be like in the states. Mukherjee once again foreshadows how Jasmine will be torn between one home and another; “This dawn, as on many others, perverts from the village across the stream sat on the bank and ogled at us.” (Mukherjee, 55) Are the perverts in the village across the stream just simple perverts or are they her past life in India, constantly haunting her? I am reminded constantly of when Jewish people were trapped in ghettos in nazi Germany. Their freedom, mentally and physically was within eyesight; just through perhaps a barb wire fence. She is like a “spirit” no body to live in and not yet up in heaven or hell.

            I remember my first day of college. I was torn and in between a rock and a hard spot. I had left my home with almost all of my belongings. I was going to a new home. It was my first night in Chico. It took time to acclimate and in order to enjoy my experience, I’ve had to use what I had learned back at home. This is the same as for Jasmine. She ends up in a new country, but relies on her childhood and adulthood to keep her going and help her stay who she is.