Chapter 3 - "The Fourth Morning"

Summary of the pages 79 - 95:

The third chapter starts off with Balrams explanation of the way he got his date of birth. When there was an elections coming up, a man with a governmental uniform visited the school to collect the pupils ages. Balram, unknowing of his age, was supposed to be in the age of eighteen to take part in the election.

The opponents of the great socialist´s party, which never seemed to be as numerous as before, finally made a regardless deal with the communists about the politics in Laxmangarh.

Balram tells how he were able to eavesdrop a dialogue between two guests when he still worked in the tea-shop. He heard about a man´s dead who was disturbing the official celebration of the socialistic election-win.

Next, you hear about the visit from the great socialist and Vijay, the former bus conductor from Laxmangarh who became Laxmangarh´s deputy.

One morning Balram got up ahead of schedule. Ram, the servant number one, made some noises when he used to eat earlier of time. Balram found out about the reason - Ram was a Muslim what displeased the Stork, which was thinking all along that Ram is a hindu. This leads to his dismissal whereby Balram became the servant number one.

Personal impressions:
When I read the situation about the election and the party´s willing to take over the politics, referring to the man died in consequence of his revolt against the party, I got the impression of a very left-wing extremist way to dominate. I were really shocked about it !

http://www.satp.org/satporgtp/countries/india/terroristoutfits/CPI_M.htm
 

Chapter 2 - "The Second Night"

Summary of the pages 54 - 78:

At first, Balram talks about the situation, in which he has to answer some questions about his caste, family and social aspects by Mukesh Sir and the Stork after he made a test drive for Mr. Ashok. Furthermore, he also bargains for his salary.

Next, Balram describes the room he lived in and had to share with an other servant, Ram Persad. Next to the issue of acting as a Maruti Suzuki driver, he tells of the duties he and servant number one also have to graduate, massaging the master, sweep the courtyard and so on.

Once Balram has to massage the Storks feets, he got, while the Stork was drinking whiskey and chatting with his sons, some hits due to his too strong massage.

There is only one activity that servant number one and servant number two have to do together.

Regularly, mostly once a week, Balram and Ram Persad went to an "English Liquor Shop" to buy an especial expensive one whiskey for his lord.

When Mr. Ashok surveys the servants room Balram and Ram live in, he gets shoked and awards them to get a better and larger one.

Mr. Ashok also awards Balram to be his and Pinky Madams driver of the Honda City when he used to be going to Laxmangarh, Mr. Ashoks and his native village.

In Laxmangarh, Balram visits his family while Mr. Ashok and Pinky Madam eat for dinner by an old man in the landlords quarter.

Proud of his uniform and fame, he got in quarrel with his family because of his wedding and left ahead of schedule.

When he returned to the car, Mr. Ashok and Pinky Madam already waited for him. On the way home, they got in a traffic jam due to a demo.

Personal impressions:

I found the behaviour of Balram very interesting. The time he still were indigent and lived in poverty, he never would be in seduction of contradict his family, but than, when Balram returned with an uniform and money, he appeared selfish and self-determined, not willing to follow any orders or suggestions.

Chapter 2 - "The Second Night"

Summary of the pages 45 - 54:

Within these pages, Balram talks about the way he got the job as Mr. Ashok´s driver. 

At first, he´s talking about the real indian situation referring to the issue of getting a good job. Instead of big cities, in which a lot of companies look for employees via advertisements, tens of  thousands living in "Darkness" give up to find a way out of poverty. 

When he got badly disappointed, Balrams granny agrees to spend her money on his driving license. In consequence of his good results, his driving instructor takes him to a brothel for free where Balram has "his first time".

Next, he narrates of his search of a job. After he went from door to door, he got the luck to meet his former landlord, which arranged a test drive for Balram. 

At last, Balram describes the way their castes have been changed. Nowadays there are only two types of casts compared to the past in which there have been thousands of casts in India.

Personal impressions:

When I compare the way of an european and someone from India to look for work, I really got astonished. The europeans are going to prepare applications, having job interviews and so on. Balram,  for example, rings at foreign houses to beg for some work. It is unprofessional and may seem to be lousy, but nevertheless, you should not forget that this could be the only way for those people to reach something!

http://www.kamat.com/kalranga/bhiksha/begging.htm

Chapter 2 - "The Second Night"

Summary of the pages 37 - 45:

In the second chapter, Balram starts to tell about his ex-employer Mr. Ashok´s face. It is such a handsome one that sometimes Balram couldn´t take his eyes off it. He also remembers his wife´s face, Pinky Madam. Even though he killed him, Balram tells that you won´t find him saying one bad thing about him.

Next, he narrates of his father´s death. After he spit blood, Balram and Kishan, his elder brother, take him to a regional government hospital.

Since no doctor is available, they lower his father to some newspaper sheets some muslims, which are also waiting for medical suppor, had added to the ground. The next day, their father dies because of his tuberculosis.

One month later, Kishan marries his wife and moves to Dhanbad. Balram and his cousin follow him to Dhanbad where they soon get work in a tea-shop.

Balram spends time in spying and overhearing customers to educate himself on his own. At last, he´s begging random strangers for a gratis driving license.

Personal impressions:

When I read the situation about Balrams father and how he died in hospital in consequence of his disease and no medical support, I got impressions of the national poverty of India. There are no doctors in hospital and it seems to be without any interest if someone dies. So I looked for a report which highlights the poverty within India:

http://www.economywatch.com/indianeconomy/poverty-in-india.html

Chapter 1 - "The First Night"

Summary of the pages 25 - 36:

The last part of the first chapter deals with Balrams father in school, a visitation of a school-inspector and a job for Balram in his father´s tea-shop.

One day after the last occurrences, his father takes Balram to school while dawn, willing to kill the lizard leading his son to faint. He kicks and smashes the lizard till death. If his father stops wheezing, a stench of crushed flesh hangs in the air.

Balram tells of Vijay, the bus conductor, which seems to be a person that made it in life.

He´s, one more time, referring to the poster and talks about the declaration of a bag. You learn something about the colour of the bag, but actually he switches over to the issue of his education, which is not mentioned on that poster. Referring to his education, Balram narrates the situation of an unexpected visit of a school-inspector, which comes to examine the schools inventory and its pupils. After Balram impressed the inspector, he gets a promise of a scholarship with an improved teaching. He also gets the nickname of "The white tiger" in consequence of his wisdom compared to the rest of his classmates.

As his family get a loan for a wedding, Balram soon has to cancel the school and has to start working with coal in his dads tea-shop.

When he´s about 13 years old, he decides to go up to a nearby fort on his own. An awesome cow is to blame that Balram actually views the fort at the age of twenty-four. At last, he describes the view over the village you get while standing on the top of the hill and, surprisingly, he´s telling that about eight months later, he slit Mr. Ashok´s throat.

Personal impressions:

I was a bit astonished about the last scene described in this chapter. The only fact that he slit his employers throat without any relation to the rest he told was very unexpected. Apart from that, I imagined a retro-like, matured fort where Balram stands to have a look at his village.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort

If you take a look at some informations on wikipedia, you´ll notice a picture of the Fort "Krak des Chevalier" on the right hand side, which I already know by the movie "Kingdom of Heaven", maybe you know it as well. :)

Chapter 1 - "The First Night"

Summary of the pages 15 - 25:

Balram Halwai, which still writes the e-mail to the prime minister and tells about his life, describes within these ten pages his village, Laxmangarh, mentions the rural lifestyle there, talks about his dad and his work as an rickshaw-puller.

At first, Balram talks about Laxmangarh. This village is in the district of Gaya that is famous because of its national history. Some people say Buddha walked through that little village which is in the near of Bodh Gaya - the place where Buddha got his Enlightenment.

Electricity poles and water tap didn´t exist where he grew up. He tells of his house and their buffalo, which the women of his family obvious were feeding more regularly than cooking their man´s dinner. He then tells us of his morning his dad woke him up to take the buffalo to a morning bath. Referring to the poster mentioned in the first 15 pages, he´s saying that he didnt wear the clothes hes accused of having worn.

Next, Balram talks of his dad, how he did an exhausting work as a rickshawk-puller instead of the rural work most of people did, of four men, known as "the animals", who were controlling this area.

Mr. Halwai writes of the employees which rushed into trains and buses to find sufficiently jobs in Delhi, Calcutta and other big cities.

At last, he lets Mr. Jiabao know how his father were reacting when he heard of his sons missing in school. He totally reacted angry and upset. His son, in which he had a lot of expectations, fainted in school for the second time in his life and never had gone back to school since that day.

Personal impressions:

When I read the part in which he describes his father and his job, underpayd and absolutely exhausting, I nearly thought of the poorness of those regions like Laxmangarh. I almost feel a bit sorry when I think of the satisfaction of western people opposed to people like Balrams dad.

http://de.academic.ru/pictures/dewiki/72/Handheld_rickshaw_puller.jpg

So I chose a picture symbolizing this situation for people without any serious problems, which rarely get notice of other ways of life.

Chapter 1 - "The First Night"

Summary of the pages 1 - 15:

The first part of the chapter one is about an entrepreneur, Balram Halwai, and the prime minister of China, Wen Jiabao. Balram Halwai lives in Bengalore, India. He writes an e-mail to the premier to talk about his arrival after the lady on "All India Radio" told it. She is also publishing, that Mr. Jiabao wants to know the truth about Bangalore. The unreliability of the media is reason for him to ask the prime minister if he really plans to come to Bangalore. About the second aspect Balram thoroughly thinks of. He thinks that he is the best one you could ask about this issue, so he tells about his life´s story and about employers in India. He wrote about children which run up to stopped cars and try to sell some bootlegged american books dealing with businesses. Mr. Halwai goes over to a short situation, in which he´s the driver of an american businessman. In his opinion, most of Indians are half-baked. Balram, which is thinking that all entrepreneurs are made from half-baked clay, carries on narrating. He tells about posters, including his face, which hang out in nearly every post, railway and police station. Referring to the poster, Balram explains how he got his name by his former teacher and why Laxmangarh, the place where he grew up, is called darkness. He narrates the moment when his mother were burned on a stage above the river Ganga, which definitly isn´t the same one all american tourists always think of. Full of feces, soggy parts of human bodies, buffalo carrion and so on. This is the reason why he advises the prime minister to not take a dip under any circumstances. In this moment, while he´s watching his mother burn and thinks of his own death, he faint and haven´t been back to see the ganga again.

Personal impressions:

I personally am amazed in which way these person is telling about his life, which is, without doubt, a painful as well as sad one so far. In my opinion, he´s narrating it with an unbelievable easiness. Next to it, I am also shocked about the use of the Ganga. On the one hand, the natives use it to clean up corpses, buffalo carrion et cetera, and on the other hand, it is a popular attraction for tourists.

http://www.sondala.de/wp/wp-content/uploads/p4055583.jpg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ganga#Pollution_and_ecology

I took these two links, because I think that they reflect the problems of the Ganga very well and symbolize the Indian´s disinterest.

Introduction

At this blog, I´m going to summarize the book "The White Tiger", written by Aravind Adiga. I´ll post summaries of every part I read so far. These summaries will be written from a personal view. Situations and sections I particularly found interesting as well as impressions I got while reading are going to be mentioned. In the end I´ll add some external links to further web pages with pictures and reports about the respective part referring to my statements.