In this section Sophie meets her mother. What stood out to me was the way she described her mother. Before this meeting, all Sophie knew about her physical appearance was based on that picture.

When she first saw her Sophie realized that She did not look like the picture Tante Atie had on her night table. She mentally described her as tired and drawn, going as far as say “It was as though she had never stopped working in the cane fields after all.” When her mother asked “Am I the mother you imagined?”, she really wasn’t. Sophie thought that she would be the epitome of women, not just physically perfect but also someone who lived in a lavish and also perfect environment – New York. It might have been a disappointment per se, but Sophie definitely had another predefined image of the woman. Her mother was supposed to move to New York for a better life but it wasn’t as good as Sophie thought.