Spoilers Ahead ;')
i wrote this aeons ago. there must've been typos and erroneous grammar, i didnt re-check. :-/
I have always
loved books that brought me to a new world. A world I’d rather live in. A world
I could exist and would rather wish I was born there instead.
My first
impression of the Hunger Games, the first book, was that it was going to be
boring. I felt District 12 was boring and it really was. The districts of Panem
were in a depressing state. The Hunger Games, despite brutal and violent is
somehow a good way to go before you die. You will feel the luxury of a blessed
life. You will eat.
What kept me
reading was the love affair. From the time Peeta confessed his love to Katniss,
I knew he was telling what was really in his heart. I just didn’t understand his
reaction on the last part of book one. When I rethink about it, I know perhaps
Katniss was the one who did not understand herself. Perhaps I am having a
Katniss crossover at that time.
I adore Cinna
and his creations. They’re just amazing.
I am excited for
the third book. I feel Gale will die, and if he won’t, Katniss will not choose
him. I just wish Panem will be a much better place when the book ends.
***
***
Yes, I have read
the third book. Gale did not die but I wish him dead. That would have been more
honourable for him. I know it is wrong to wish for someone to die. Sorry, I
take it back.
I know that I
have written earlier that it was the love affair that kept me wanting to read
the story. It was true. Now that I have read the entire series and have been thinking
through the book, I feel that what hooked me to the books was the fact that
Panem is where our civilization is going. And somehow, when I tell myself that
I am/was hooked to the love story, I suddenly feel that I am like a Capitol
citizen. Someone who loves being entertained, watching TV shows, movies, etc.
Someone who would believe and “feel” that it is the real thing going on there
in the TV screen.
I feel bad about
that. Maybe that is why I first felt the book was boring. The districts of
Panem were in turmoil. War has plagued them and they are trying to live a life
that would avoid the war that they’ve been through. So the districts agree and Capitol is sort of
like their punisher. Capitol people host the Hunger Games. Capitol people do
not realize that real lives are destroyed in a game which to them was
entertainment.
District 13 may
have been wanted to break away from that civilization and create a new world
where everybody was equal, happy, and living sustainably. But, it was always
the people who govern and lead that have some other agenda. President Coin
clearly would have wanted the rest of Panem to stay in the miserable,
poverty-stricken, hunger-filled state they were in as long as she was leading
the country. As long as she has power. Doesn’t this situation sound so
familiar?
Even in an
imaginary future where Panem exists, the problem that they face is still as
identical as what we have now. Poverty, hunger, inequality, reality TV shows,
indifference, war, rebellion, a rallying point, loveteams. I was side-tracked
by the loveteam, the star-crossed lovers, the rebels in the story who keep
spouting these dreamy lines. In as distant time in the future where Panem
exists, surely the same theme in TV shows would have made us puke and change
the channel. But yeah, it is always interesting every time. Every time we
believe that it is true. I know I did doubt Peeta in the beginning. But after
one or two pages, I knew it was true. But in the real world, the real
entertainment world, you’d be a Capitol citizen to believe it.