Jakob

Task 1:

1. Sounds in the night (p. 128, l. 1 - p. 128, l. 30)
2. Burgled by mice (p. 128, l. 31 - p. 129, l. 11)
3. What to do? (p. 129, l. 12 - p. 129, l. 26)
4. Getting traps (p. 129, l. 13 - p. 130, l. 23)
5. Following night, no capture (p. 130, l. 24 - p. 130, l. 45)
6. Kumar finds out (p. 131, l. 1 - p. 131, l. 36)
7. Time to call the Council (p. 131, l. 37 - p. 132, l. 41)
8. Burglary at the shop (p. 132, l. 42 - p. 133, l. 12)
9. Bad news (p. 133, l. 13 - p. 134, l. 18)
10. King rat (p. 134, l. 19 - p. 134, l. 29)
11. Hope to find the crack (p. 134, l. 30 - p. 135, l. 9)
12. He said a funny thing (p. 135, l. 10 - p. 135, l. 17)


Task 2:

First-person narrator from Indrani's point view.
" From then on, I was to embarrassed to go anywhere except to places where you can help yourself." (p. 130, l. 3-4)


Task 3:

Indrani is from India, which we see in the quote "(..) they looked a little funny with my rose-pink sari." (p. 129, l. 36-37)
A sari is Indian women's clothes.
She is a nervous person who has a lot of thoughts about what the neighbours would think if they discovered that they have mice, it says "I am not what you call a sound sleeper, being somewhat of a nervous disposition when it comes to noises at the night, and what with burglaries and people putting horrible things through letter boxes, you can't be too careful." (p. 128, l. 1-45) and "(..) didn't fell like going to her and saying "Excuse me, I think we have mice and what can be dine about it?" She might have screamed and thought we were dirty or something." (p. 129, l. 16-18).
Indrani is also kind of scared or submissive to her husband. She does not tell him about her discovery, because she is afraid of his reaction, which is seen in the following quote "So I lay there for a long time worrying and thinking I would say nothing to Kumar, or he would say I was a bad housewife, and what should I do to get rid with of them." (p. 128, l. 40 - p. 129, l. 2)


Task 4:

 The story takes place in England, Wanstead which is a suburb to London.
And socially it takes place in the higher middle class, it says "(..) where the suburbs are green and leafy and the houses expensive (...)" (p. 128, l. 13-14)


Task 5:

The rats symbolize invaders which in this context means immigrants. Kumar and Indrani lives in a neigbourhood where mostly British people lives and people does not think Kumar and Indrani belong there, which this quote shows us "What are Asians doing in nice houses like those? Turning them into slums by the sound of it." (p. 130, l. 16-17). It makes it obvious that the British people does not fancy immigrants in such a nice neigbourhood.
 The British people sees the immigrants like rats which the man for the Council makes quite clear with his comment in the ending of the text, it says "Anyway, we can't kill them all.The main thing is to send them back where they came from, and then pretend they ain't there. Know what I mean?" (p. 135, l. 14-16) And "They came over on the ships, you see. From out East, so they say. Still you'd know all about that, I suppose." (p. 132, l. 16-17).


Task 6:

The title has two meanings. The first one, the rats lives straight under us. And second, the xenophobia is straight under the surface of people's mind. It is not visibly all the time but sometimes it comes out in different ways. An evil comment, like the quote from the task just above. Also the racist attack on Kumar's shop.


Task 7:

Xenophobia

Clash of culture

Immigration

Fear