Shmoop Hair Inside Out and Bakc Again

Inside Out & Back Again

by Thanhha Lai

Kim Hà Timeline and Summary

• It is Tet, New Year, and Hà is happy because she gets to celebrate her tenth birthday. That night, she gets mad that her mother asks her brother to step on the floor first thing in the morning before anyone else because male feet are said to be lucky.
• Instead, Hà puts her toe on the floor first while everyone sleeps.
• Hà introduces herself, and tells us about her brothers and how they tease her.
• We learn about a papaya tree she has grown to love and vows to see the fruit on it ripen first, before anyone else does.
• Soon after, Hà's best friend TiTi leaves with her family. They are rich and can pay to escape Saigon and the war, but Hà is happy she gets to stay there.
• Hà recalls the story about her father going missing during a mission for the navy. That was nine years ago but her family still waits for him.
• Brother Khoi doesn't want to eat his eggs, he wants to hatch them, but Hà wants to eat hers and so she doesn't support him in trying to hatch the eggs.
• In school, the children usually talk about current news, but now it's all about the war, so they are not allowed to talk about it anymore, and instead are only supposed to talk about happy things—but no one has anything to say.
• We learn how Hà came up with a system to skim some money off the top when buying groceries in order to buy herself treats.
• It seems like Hà really loves papaya.
• Hà remembers the few things she has learned about her dad, but it isn't much.
• When Brother Quang begins raving about politics and the war, Hà wants to complain about how he shows off his education by using big words, but her mother quiets her down.
• For Hà's real birthday, she gets a candy and a wish. She asks to hear stories from her mother's life and learns about how she and Father were married and how Communism divided the country, splitting them off from their families in the north.
• Then Hà writes down all of her secret birthday wishes: to look more grown up, to have a sister, to have her father come home.
• One day, Hà and her mother go downtown to a ceremony to honor war wives and collect the free food they give out.
• The family is poor; they do not have much food and it makes Hà's mother sad for her.
• During school, a siren goes off ending school early for the year. Hà is upset because she didn't want to go home before finishing the math problem she is working on, so she pinches the teacher's pet.
• Hà checks on her papaya tree and sees buds.
• Hà's father's best friend, Uncle Son, comes over to tell them that navy ships are going to take people away soon and they should be ready to leave through Hà's house.
• There is a family meeting, and they discuss whether to flee their home.
• Brother Khoi hatches a chick and convinces Hà to agree not to leave with the family, but Mother sews them packs to leave and Khoi gets talked into changing his tune.
• Hà picks one personal item to bring with her: an old, worn-out doll.
• While trying to push onto the packed navy ship, Vu pushes them forward and on board, and Hà vows to never tease him about being like Bruce Lee again.
• They float along a river on the ship. Hà is starving and has to pee a lot, which is no good.
• Brother Khoi brings the chick on board and it dies. It rots, and when it is taken away from him, he gets super sad and goes a little crazy, so Hà helps him feel better by wrapping the dead chick in her doll and tossing them overboard.
• She is so happy when they get rescued that she snatches a blonde hair from a sailor's arm.
• In a tent city, Hà's family is adopted by a cowboy, whom Hà hopes has a horse she can ride, but alas he does not.
• In the basement of the house, Hà learns English and it's wicked hard for her.
• In her new school, Hà notices that there are a bunch of races of kids, just not anyone like her.
• She can't eat American food, and she doesn't know what any of it is. Then a boy, Pink Boy, pokes and pushes Hà and everyone laughs at her; she can't understand what they are saying.
• Pink Boy chases her after school, too, and says a lot of things that she can't understand.
• Brother Vu agrees to teach Hà self-defense with martial arts.
• Hà finds that her neighbors are prejudiced, too, and hate her family—everyone except for Mrs. Washington, that is, who becomes their tutor.
• Then the cowboy takes them to be baptized in church, which Hà hates, but the cowboy thinks will make people like them more.
• Mrs. Washington finds out that Hà doesn't eat lunch and hides in the bathroom, so she decides to pack her a lunch and arrange for her to eat lunch in class; this is when Hà meets Pam and Steven, her first friends.
• Pink Boy gets ticked off when Hà shows him up during a math lesson, and arranges to have his big cousin knock Hà down to size.
• Brother Khoi has a plan, though, involving Hà's friends distracting the bullies, but it doesn't work and Pink Boy chases after Hà anyway.
• When he confronts her and tries to punch her, she uses her super martial arts moves to get out of his way, and he falls, defeated by wit.
• Vu pulls up on his awesome chopper, and whisks Hà away. So. Cool.
• After that, no one bothers Hà any more.
• The family celebrates Christmas in their own way with the cowboy and Mrs. Washington. Pam gives Hà another dolly, and Hà tries dried papaya, but is more than disappointed by it.
• Once it is finally Tet again, the family is doing well, and seems to be on their way to happiness. Hà hopes to get better at martial arts.

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Source: https://www.shmoop.com/inside-out-and-back-again/ha%27s-timeline.html

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