55 pages • 1 hour read
Randa JarrarA Map of Home
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2008A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Part 2, Chapters 9-12Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 2, Chapter 9 Summary: “The Travelers”
Nidali, Mama, Baba, and Gamal flee the country with Nidali’s cousins, aunt, and uncle, driving toward the border in a caravan of three cars. As they pass various checkpoints, Baba bribes guards with ties and whiskey. During their journey, Nidali starts her period but doesn’t tell anyone.
Aunt Naila pulls over on the side of the road in her old car. She props open the hood, and as she talks to Mama, she lights a cigarette and throws the match to the ground. The wind picks up the match, blows it into the engine, and the car catches on fire.
They leave the car behind, driving away with the men and boys in the car in front and the women and girls driving behind, “in front of us the way they stood in front of us at prayer” (153). Nidali writes an angry letter addressed to Saddam Hussein, then tears it up and flings the pieces out the window.
They arrive at a village called al-Rahhaliya. They stop in front of a small café owned by a very old woman. The outhouse is clean, unlike at the other rest stops they’ve encountered. Nidali uses a basin of clean water to take a makeshift shower. The woman tells their group that she has seen many invasions over the years since her birth in 1886 and that “they all come and go” (158).
Part 2, Chapter 10 Summary: “In Transit”
Nidali and her immediate family say goodbye to her aunt, uncle, and cousins and fly to Egypt to stay in Alexandria for the winter. They move into a small apartment by the beach that Mama still owns. Nidali reflects on how empty the streets look—the normally bustling beachside town, which she previously only visited in the summers, now looks deserted and cold.
Nidali’s parents tell her that she will attend school even though she already missed part of the school year, because in Egypt, ninth-grade students only get graded on their final exam at the end of the year; she can still study and take the final exam. Nidali protests, and Baba slaps her. Mama pulls Baba off of Nidali, and Nidali screams at him that she will not attend school. Her parents force her to attend anyway.
At school, she is teased for being half-Palestinian. She becomes friends with a girl named Jiji. One day at recess, they talk about kissing; Jiji has never been kissed. Nidali thinks to herself that she would give Jiji her first kiss.
Jiji invites Nidali to dinner at her home, and even though Baba forbids Nidali from going, she goes anyway. After dinner, in Jiji’s room, Nidali offers to practice kissing with Jiji. After her initial shock (“You mean, like lizzies?”), Jiji agrees to kiss her (174). They make out until someone knocks on the door.
Later that night, Baba beats Nidali for disobeying him. She replays the memory of the kiss in her head to take the pain away. Afterward, in bed, Nidali and Gamal compare their various bruises, “like bomb sites on two different maps” (177). Gamal says he dreams of their mom turning into a superhero and saving them.
Geddo, Nidali’s grandfather, suffers a fall after going through an insulin withdrawal. Nidali convinces her parents to let her stay with Geddo and look after him for a month.
Part 2, Chapter 11 Summary: “This Is War”
Nidali wanders around town by herself. She decides to visit her grandmother’s grave and convinces the guard to let her into the cemetery even though she doesn’t have money to tip him. She enters and realizes she doesn’t know which grave is Yia Yia’s because she can’t read Greek. Then she spots her grandfather standing over one of the graves, but she panics and runs away.
A bicyclist crashes into her and she realizes it’s Fakhr. His family fled the country and is staying in Sidi Gaber, another neighborhood in Alexandria. They walk together down an alley, and when no one is looking, Fakhr kisses Nidali. Nidali tells him never to do that again; public kissing is illegal in Egypt. Fakhr asks if he can be Nidali’s boyfriend, and she says yes. They meet up every day, sneaking into abandoned beach homes to make out in secret.
Baba finds out that Palestinians will not be allowed back into Kuwait; the family will have to stay in Egypt. Baba grows depressed. One day, Nidali draws a map of Palestine and asks Baba if it’s correct. “Who knows?” he says (193), and he explains that the map will look different depending on the year.
Nidali spends the next two weeks studying. She is sad about the news, and to distract herself from her sadness, she writes a play. Fakhr calls and she tells him that she won’t be able to go back to Kuwait. She gets in a fight with him and hangs up.
The morning of her final exams, Nidali and her family accidentally oversleep. They rush out the door but are greeted by gridlock traffic. An ambulance approaches from behind, blaring its siren, and cars part to let it through. Baba has an idea: As soon as the ambulance passes by, he follows it, tailing it closely as they hurry toward the school. They arrive on time.
Part 2, Chapter 12 Summary: “The Pride of Religion”
Nidali decides that she misses kissing Fakhr; she doesn’t miss him specifically, just the act of kissing. They had a falling out after their fight on the phone, but she arranges to meet up with him “for a truce” (198).
They find a deserted corner of the beach. They make out, take their shirts off, and begin touching each other. Nidali explains that she is used to masturbating with the stream of water from a bidet and that Fakhr’s movements should imitate the gentleness of water. Taking her instructions, Fakhr brings her to orgasm.
Over the next few weeks, Baba decides to look for a job in America. Nidali tries to imagine what it will be like. She fantasizes about having a school locker—somewhere private to store her things. Eventually, Baba finds a job in Texas.
Nidali receives her grades; she earned a 92% average. She is elated at her high scores.
Baba departs for Texas. With Baba gone, Nidali feels emboldened to do what she wants. She lies to her mother about staying at Jiji’s and instead takes a taxi to Montazah. At the beach, she takes off her clothes and swims in the sea. She sees Fakhr on the shore, and he swims out to join her. They make out and rub against each other, embracing in the waves.
Mama announces that they will be moving to America to join Baba. Nidali “had always thought of America as the coolest kid in the world, one who would never acknowledge our existence” (207). But now, Nidali says, America “proved that it cared about Kuwait’s existence, or at least about controlling Saddam and oil prices” (207), so moving to America seems attainable.
Nidali and Fakhr meet up every day, sneaking into abandoned places to kiss in secret. He asks her what she wants to be when she grows up, and she refuses to tell him. That night, he calls her, insisting that he needs to be able to picture her in the future. She tells him that she wants to be a writer.
Part 2, Chapters 9-12 Analysis
In these chapters, the narrative explores Nidali’s coming-of-age through her desire, self-discovery, freedom, and aspirations. Jarrar utilizes vivid descriptions and sensual language to depict Nidali’s growing exploration of her sexuality. Nidali describes kissing Jiji as a sensory delight: “I was licking a gelato on the beach at summer” (175). These descriptions convey the excitement of teenage exploration. Even though she feels guilt over her queerness—“It was bad, bad bad, and I was bad,” she thinks to herself (176)—Nidali’s memory of kissing Jiji manages to buoy her through her father’s violence even though she knows her desires go against societal norms. Nidali experiments with Fakhr as well as Jiji. She shows growth as a character, as she is confident enough to name what she wants from Fakhr during their sexual encounters.
The tone of these chapters is intimate, as Nidali navigates her desires and experiences a newfound sense of freedom in the absence of her father. The emerging sense of desire and self-discovery become evident in Nidali’s experiences with Fakhr. Nidali’s characterization develops further as she becomes more independent and takes risks, lying to her mother and engaging in intimate encounters with Fakhr.
Furthermore, the imagery of Nidali swimming naked in the sea and embracing Fakhr in the waves evokes a sense of liberation. The setting of these chapters, particularly the beach at Montazah, serves as a symbolic space where Nidali can explore her desires and indulge in her newfound freedom. Within this setting, Jarrar uses the motif of the pen. Nidali fantasizes that she spies a pen underwater, buried amongst hidden artifacts: “ancient ruins [… ,] those sunken subkingdoms [….] I saw pink granite gods, and a sphinx of Cleopatra’s baby” (206). This associates the pen with hidden treasure—something valuable and worth uncovering. She imagines moving closer to the pen, underscoring her yearning and desire for agency. The ocean is a setting for both Nidali’s physical exploration of her sexuality as well as the metaphorical representation of her yearning to be a writer.
Nidali’s conversation with Fakhr, in which she reveals her aspiration to become a writer, also alludes to the motif of the pen. This conversation between Nidali and Fakhr highlights her desire for self-expression and independence. Nidali’s initial reluctance to tell Fakhr about her dream career reflects her hesitance to embrace a future that deviates from Baba’s vision, but the fact that she finally shares the truth aloud with Fakhr indicates her growing confidence and belief in herself.
The motif of the map reappears in these chapters. Nidali draws a map of Palestine and asks Baba if it is correct. He says that the map will look different depending on the year in question. This highlights the theme of Multicultural Identity and the Meaning of Home, emphasizing that to be Palestinian is to have a shifting sense of belonging and identity. Additionally, after Baba abuses them, Nidali and Gamal compare bruises as if comparing “maps.” This suggests that their experiences of pain and trauma are a part of their shared history, and it further echoes the association of maps with violence and conflict.
The theme of Multicultural Identity and the Meaning of Home also emerges as Nidali visits her grandmother’s grave. Yia Yia is buried in a Greek Christian cemetery in Alexandria. Nidali is Muslim and she does not read Greek. The contrasting cultures and religions in this scene highlight the complexities of Nidali’s identity and the multiple layers of her heritage. She feels lost amongst the tombstones. Most of them have crosses on them, and Nidali is baffled by the crosses, as she searches for the “simple” cross on her grandmother’s grave: “I wondered if, back when they used to crucify people, the crucified people ever thought their crosses were simple” (183). Although Nidali has Greek heritage, she does not fully belong within the environment of this cemetery. Moreover, her grandmother’s body is also displaced from her homeland: She is buried in Egypt.
