Sarah's A-POP Blog

A Temporary Marriage

• “Mrs. Shin thanked him, all the time wondering if he was as innocuous as he looked. …They needed photos to authenticate their engagement, then their marriage, to immigration.” (pg 2) Mrs. Shin is obviously extremely uncomfortable with being around Mr. Rhee, and exhibits all the same fears that women in the US have concerning strange men, so the marriage thing really surprised me. This really hits home the reality that people in Mrs. Shin’s situation are often really dependant on the goodwill of others, and the unknowns associated with coming to America can be terrifying. Intellectually I knew this already, but this helps make it much more apparent on a personal level.
• “They had done well enough until the recent recession, which had even lawyers watching their expense accounts.” (pg 4) This story seems like it’s set more recently than the other books we’ve read so far, which all seemed to almost make immigration and its related struggles a thing of the past as a result of being set decades ago. In this, immigration still seems to be a struggle financially at the very least.

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