To Mina and others abroad, America “represented the only way out—not a solution but a chance to keep hope alive and burning” (116). America is an opportunity. Mr. Park believes that hard work in America guarantees success, citing his own affluence as evidence. For other characters, however, moving to America reminds them that opportunities can also go wrong. Margot believes: “Growing up American was all about erasing the past—lightly acknowledging it but then forgetting it and moving on” (44). Margot reinforces this view later when she notices how quickly America moved on after the riots following the beating of Rodney King.

American culture shocks Mina, from the food to the language to the excess. She can’t believe how many Americans carry guns, even though she fled a country destroyed by war: “She had never seen so many guns on men who were not in the military until coming to America. From what were they all protecting themselves?” (196). When Margot walks through the swap meet where her mother worked, she wonders why she hated her mother’s lifestyle so much:

Perhaps sprawling lawns and shopping malls were one version of the American dream, but this was another […] maybe it was not mainstream, maybe it was not seen with any compassion or complexity on television or in the movies, because it represented all that middle-and-upper-class people, including Margot, feared and therefore despised: a seemingly inescapable, cyclical poverty (78).