Throughout the first half of the story, a pattern linking important relationships/memories and food emerges with, what I believe, a great significance. Estrella often used food, not only as points on the timeline of survival, but as a symbol of other means of coping. As her family travels, she often focuses on when they are able to obtain food and cure their physical hunger, yet there is a deeper meaning. Family is important to Estrella; however, the fact that she wishes to have a real relationship with her father rather than an adopted one with Perfecto continues to pop up. By using food as a extension of her memories, she carries these pieces of her past with her to help tolerate her dislocation. Every time she comes into contact with certain types of food she remembers pieces of her past; whether she wants to or not. These memories keep her grounded in reality, consistently reminding her of what she has despite what she has lost. Everyday is a struggle to find new food and to form new memories in spite of the hard times she, and her family, must face. For example, when Estrella sees or eats an orange, she attaches that memory to her father (p. 12). The last time she saw him, he peeled an orange for her; aiding in her survival. Now that he is gone, Estrella must do this on her own, but she'll never forget this lesson as she carries on. The orange signifies, not only a tie to her father that she is desperately trying to keep in her memory, but also every act of living leaves some taste in one's mouth.
I didn't notice this when reading but I can totally see it now that you have mentioned it. Food is one of those things that are very powerful. Food can be associated with smells, colors, flavors, textures, its hard to not pair memories up with these senses as well. The idea of something as simple as food being so important is a crazy thought. We take the fact that we don't know hunger for grated because something that seems to be mistreated for us is in fact a necessity for life, not another one of our luxuries. Because food is something that is much more scarce in her life it takes on greater meaning than we typically attribute to our food.
ReplyDeleteI had noticed the particular attachment to fruit, something they pick for other people's pleasure around the world. It is interesting that the fruit they pick seems to be such a luxury to them although they work with it everyday of their lives. The narrator takes the time to describe the juices and "meat" of each fruit for a sweet significance. Not only are there oranges but peaches and grapes.
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