It was hard to believe they had separate existences, that they had been separate entities and not Mama Papa in one breath.
By establishing this "entity" of Mama and Papa this early on, the reader is forewarned what exactly Uma is going to be dealing with. As we learn more about her and her inability to make a life for herself outside of her parents and family home, we can hearken back to this oppressive force of MamaPapa, PapaMama. They are two fused into one, totally indivisible, completely insurmountable. Uma can find no solace in one vs the other, and is helpless in the face of their united front.
"In my day, girls in the family were not given sweets, nuts, good things to eat. If something special had been bought in the market, it was given to the boys in the family."
Mama's reminiscing about her own childhood, which featured different treatment for boys and girls, establishes a few different things for the narration. The first is that gender inequities have persisted in India for a long, long time. The second is that, as the reader will find out the more they read, those inequities have not vanished; in fact, they are still there in the ways that matter most—i.e., women's bodily autonomy, domestic violence, independence, etc. Third, Mama is not at all sympathetic to contemporary young women's claims of unfairness, as she remembers a time when the treatment was far worse. This plays out in her relationship with Uma, following Papa's lead in severely restricting her grown daughter's autonomy.
Uma can no longer pretend to be ignorant of Papa's needs, Papa's ways... She picks out the largest orange in the bowl and hands it to Mama, who peels it into strips, then divides it into separate segments. Each segment is then peeled and freed of pips and threads till only the perfect globules of juice are left, and then passed, one by one, to the edge of Papa's plate. One by one, he lifts them with the tips of his fingers and places them into his mouth.
This ceremony of sorts encapsulates the hierarchy in the household. Uma has the lowliest job of selecting the orange, and then Mama meticulously prepares it for Papa, who eats it. The women do not share in the eating of the orange; they only work and watch. The patriarch is clearly the head of the household, and his whims, no matter how capricious, must be attended to.
"We are not sending you back to school, Uma. You are staying at home to help with Arun."
Patriarchy establishes a dichotomous educational world for boys and girls, with boys meant to attend school and attain a career, and girls to marry and produce children. For Uma, this is a gravely sad reality, for she loves school and learning (and ends up never marrying). Thus, we can associate the "fasting" part of novel's title with Uma, who is fasting from education, from independence, from opportunity and adventure.
If one word could sum up Arun's childhood—or at least Uma's abiding impression of it—that word was "education."
In contrast to Uma and fasting, we have Arun and feasting. Since he, as a male, is the apple of his parents' eyes, he is given every opportunity. He attends school religiously and is accepted into college in the United States, monetarily supported by his parents. He is "feasting," but just like his sister, he is unhappy with the situation, and it is perhaps more apropos to see the feasting as forced feeding. Against his will, which continues to weaken over time, he attends school when he does not seem to care about it, relinquishes the hobbies that make him happy, and generally accepts his father's plans for him. Desai thus suggests that both extremes of fasting and feasting are problematic and harmful.
...the food is not very good.
While this might initially seem like a quotidian thing to say, almost a throwaway line, it reveals itself to be a deliciously humorous understatement once the reader finishes Arun's section. The food not only isn't good, it is also offensive (the meat), bland (the simple things Mrs. Patton thinks Arun wants to eat, like a tomato), disgusting (the Indian dish Mrs. Patton practically forces Arun to cook), or completely unsalutary (ice cream and candy). And by saying the food isn't good in a country where food is identity, Arun is actually making a larger point about American culture in general.
"And now you, Aaroon," commands Mr. Patton, sliding the spatula under another slab that is blackened upon the coals. "This should be just right for you, Red."
These are prime examples of microaggressions—small, pointed comments that are usually racist in nature, delivered with ignorance and/or mild mockery. Neither Mr. or Mrs. Patton can pronounce Arun's name properly, which might seem like a small matter except that it indicates they do not value his personhood. And Mr. Patton's delight in learning that Arun means "red" in Hindi means that Arun will be called "Red" often, even though it is not his name, may be a racist reference to his skin tone, and isn't even accurate—Mr. Patton didn't bother listening further so he could learn that the type of red was associated with sunsets.
She might have been on display in the Foodmart, a special offer for the summer, gleaming with invitation. Almost, one feels, one might see a discount sign above it.
This is a particularly vicious observation of Arun's as he sees Mrs. Patton sunbathing. He is uncomfortable by the gratuitous display of flesh, not for any particularly prudish reason, but because it reminds him of the other things that make him uncomfortable here in America—the gratuitous consumption of flesh in the barbecues Mr. Patton and other suburbanites constantly hold.
Mrs. Patton no longer lies in the yard, sunbathing. The days are warm and still, with a silvery sheen, but she seems to have taken an aversion to the light, even to the outdoors. She no longer spends much time in the kitchen either.
Desai never makes it completely clear why Mrs. Patton experiences such a powerful change in her personality, but it is most likely due to what happened with Melanie. Her finding Melanie in the forest was an incredibly surprising wake-up call, one completely unanticipated given her blithely ignorant modus operandi. She seems to have repressed most of her discontents, pretending everything was perfect in her family, and seeing what was actually going on with her daughter—the failure of the mother to feed the daughter, to carry out her role in the household—instituted a profound shift.
"Please take these things—my parents sent them for you," he lies, hoping they will never guess what happened to their gifts...
Arun does not want the gifts from his family, which arrive rather inauspiciously on the day he is leaving the Pattons' house, and rather than packing them, which is almost impossible given his perfectly organized suitcase, he decides to tell a white lie and give them to Mrs. Patton. This is a simple gesture, yes, and may not mean much more than meets the eye, but it may also symbolize Arun further cutting ties with his family in India. Perhaps he will not return there; perhaps he will start carving his own path. This seems a real possibility in light of his leaving behind their gifts, which is almost like leaving them all behind as well.
