The promise of the Hidden Immunity Idol dramatically raises one person's hope for survival

      
    "I have got to get the hell out of Chico."  -My roomate, all my friends, my cousin, me.

    Many times I have expressed my need to get out of Chico, to leave this place and find bigger and better things. Almost anyone I know that has lived here for an extended period of time has said those words. But why? Why is there such a strong desire to get out of here? What is it that all these people feel the need to escape from? I don't know the answer, even though I feel the need to leave myself.  But perhaps it is ok, to not know exactly why you need to leave, to not know what it is you are running from. It doesn't take any urgency away from needing to leave. You don't have to know what someone is running from, to know they are running.

    This is how I view our current novel Jasmine by Bharati Mukherjee. The title character, a pregnant Punjabi woman of many names is living in a small town in Iowa with her paraplegic boyfriend and adopted son. We don't know much about the history of Jasmine yet. We know she left her home country  but we don't know why. Was she running toward a goal, a new life? I think that is not the case. I think she is running away from her old one. There is a sense of urgency in the peaceful life she leads in Iowa. She is a smart educated woman, who is just playing the part of the quiet house wife. Mukherjee allows us to be a part of the inner thoughts of Jasmine, which are show how she is very aware of her environment and know how to read and manipulate the people around her.

    "He kisses my chin, my cheeks, my eyelids, my temples. His lips scuttle across my forehead; they warm the cold pale star of my scar. My third eye glows, a spotlight trained on lives to come. This isn't a vision to share with Bud. He is happy. I am happy enough."

    Jasmine is aware of so much more than she is letting on. Yet she chooses to stay in this safe environment provided to her by Bud and by Iowa. This is not the behavior of someone who is running toward something, of someone who is striving. Jasmine is to busy surviving to make time or energy to strive. She is content to do the motions is takes to show love to Bud, but she is aware that they are motions, not emotions. She loves him, but for the safety he provides, not for the romance or relationship. As her third eye glows, it foreshadows changes to come, possibilities ahead. But Jasmine does not share those with her partner. By keeping to herself we see that he moves to remain stable are strategic and calculated. She knows how Bud would react and she does not wish to stir the pot. She is choosing to survive.

    I searched and searched for the a fitting image to put here. One that would show the look of a person who was surviving instead of thriving. All the images I found were too sad or too emotionless. Mostly I found images from the American game show "Survivor."  It shows how little the American knows about not knowing if or how you will survive. We make a media frenzy out of what is unchanging torture for many people. With Jasmine we are able to see the change in someone who makes it out of there alive. It is a hard balance to be content with survival. You never seem to loose that sense of fear, of when the next tragedy will strike you. The image painted by Mukherjee shows this balance. Something hard to find and hard to understand.