The life of Pi

I just want to say now that many of my blog posts will most likely contain spoilers in them, so if you don't want to know what happens, don't read these!

This book is amazing. I'm not sure exactly what it is, the style of writing, the topics, the harsh reality of it, I can't be certain, but it's a really good read. It's now focusing more on the main character of the story, Piscine Molitor Patel, aka Pi. That's right, Pi, 3.14. The reason he's called this? Torment, people would call him Pissing and he hated it, so when he finally changed schools he immediately told people that he was known as Pi. This reminded me very much of Piggy and shows just what Piggy could have done instead of telling Ralph what he hated to be called. As Pi states, the cruelty of children comes as news to no one, I wonder why that is.

The real interesting parts of what I read had to do with both religion and the zoo. Pi meets his biology professor Mr.Kumar in the Zoo his father works at and starts to talk to him. The conversation leads the religion and Kumar says that he's an atheist and that religion is darkness. Pi couldn't respond, not because he was mad (Pi is very religious) but because he was afraid that Kumar would shoot down something so precious to Pi.

I think the book's straight forward approach to things is what really gets me. I love how there are such black and white situations that really make you go "Oh...huh I never thought of it that way before." I myself am not confident in religion, but am not an atheist. I'm fine living life in the here and now, not relaying on science or god for the proof of my existence, I'm curious to see how this plays out later on in the book.

The final thing that was very, well, shocking to say the least would be what Pi's father did. He had Pi and his brother come with him to the Tiger zoo, where he then had them watch a starved 550 lb tiger kill and eat a goat. I'm sure people reading this immediately thought that his father is deprived and heartless, but the reason he did it was for the kids to learn. To learn the reality of what animals, just that, animals. Creatures who will kill anything to keep themselves alive. He then goes on and talks about many animals, describing just what they'd do in desperate situations. It's a weird blend, religion and zoology, but I like it. You get the deep, philosophical aspects of religion and the cool facts about animals you wouldn't normally know about. Take those ideas and use them to look at society and you've got one unique book.

42 pages down, 314 pages to go.