Amir is living with his father, Baba, along with his servant Ali, and his son Hassan, in a large house in Wazir Akbar Khan, an affluent neighborhood in 1970’s Kabul in Afghanistan. Resenting his father’s disappointment looming on him for not being courageous and strong enough, Amir is constantly seeking his father’s attention and affection.
Baba shows deep affection for Hassan. Despite the contempt that Amir holds regarding his father’s close relationship with the servant’s son, Amir and Hassan are best friends who have shared most of their childhood together. But, there friendship is by no means shielded from the burden that their ethnic belonging set on them in Afghanistan. For Amir, a son of a wealthy Pashtun family, is not expected to share such a friendship with a poor Hazara (Hassan) regarded as an inferior ethnic group in relation to the Pashtun.
…show more content…
Amir is the kite fighter, and Hassan is the kite runner (the one who catches the defeated kite after it falls from the sky), famed for his ability to know where the kite will fall without even looking. When Amir becomes tournament champion for the very first time, and earns his father’s respect he has longed for, Hasan get bullied and raped by Assef, who bullied Amir because of his friendship with Hassan. Having witnessed his friend being raped and yet too afraid to help him or act, Amir is incapable of facing Hassan. Thus, he fakes an accusation of Ali which leads to him being dismissed from the house by Baba, in attempt to get rid of the guilt he feels towards his