At the start of this section of the novel, why is the amount of food that Hà and her family are allowed to eat limited? They hav
e very little money because they had to pay a great deal in order to escape from Vietnam. The family is on board a boat with limited supplies, and it is not certain when they will be rescued. They are about to leave Vietnam and must bring as much food as possible with them when they go. The family has been arrested by the North Vietnamese army, and they are being held in prison.
Shakespeare used stories from older books of all sorts for his non-historical plays. He borrowed from Latin and Greek authors as well as adapting stories from elsewhere in Europe. Hamlet is borrowed from an old Scandinavian tale, but Romeo and Juliet comes from an Italian writer writing at the same time as Shakespeare.
