I enjoyed reading this week’s book “Papi” by Rita Indiana, not only because of the themes it explores, but especially because of how the writer adapted the story of the novel to the perspective of a kid, who is the narrator. The narrator is a young girl from the Dominican Republic who talks about her father, “Papi”, who left her, her mom, and the rest of the family behind to migrate to the United States. He is not present in their lives anymore, at least in a physical way, and they don’t see each other very often, sometimes every few months, or even every few years. She doesn’t really know when he will come back, but we can see how in the back of her mind, although she claims to sometimes forget about him, she has the hope that he will be back soon. Here is when he see the story through the eyes of a young girl, who seems to not fully understand the situation and is still waiting for her father to return. However, at the same time, she also feels abandoned by him and expresses anger and hate towards the absent figure of Papi, partly because she mimics her mom’s and grandmother’s opinions.

We can see throughout the story that the father not only left to work in the US and earn money, but he also has a new life, goes out with other women, and even had other kids. As the narrator explains, on he didn’t visit on Christmas, but they would receive cards from him “signed by Papi and one of his girlfriends and one of my new little siblings.” The narrator is clearly affected by her father’s absence, but she has conflicting perspectives and opinions about her father. On the one hand, we can observe her feeling of resent, but on the other hand, a feeling of admiration. This feeling of admiration towards Papi is one of the elements of the book that transmit more innocence and portray how naive kids can be in these situations. However, it also portrays the cultural and historical mindset that Dominicans had back then about people who left the island to live in the US and became wealthy, as discussed in the conversation with Arturo Victoriano.

Despite feeling abandoned, she also demonstrates admiration to her father’s success and wealth after constructing a life abroad. She talks about how her dad has so much money that he can’t fit it inside his wallet, and in an innocent way, she explains to the readers how Papi uses that money to buy her numerous things, an obvious way of also buying her forgiveness. “Then Papi goes shopping. And I go with him. Cuz he’s my dad and I’m his daughter. And Papi buys so many things, I forget how many.” The narrator brags about her father’s wealth multiple times, mentioning his outfits, the cars he owns, or his golden chains, which were signs of success. In my opinion, restating her father’s wealth and material possessions is the girl’s way of justifying her father’s absence in her life, which I guess would be the mindset of many kids in that situation.

What do you think about the narrator’s opinions and feelings towards Papi? Why do you think the story would be different if the narrator was an adult talking about her childhood instead of having a child as a narrator?