It is often in times of disaster that we find out peoples true nature. After Hurricane Katrina many people in New Orleans got scared and worried about what would happen to them, their families and their friends. When scared, people do things they would never dream of during normal times. In the novel Zeitoun, by Dave Eggers, this is shown to be true over and over again. If a natural disaster anywhere close to the magnitude of Hurricane Katrina hit my own small hometown of Yellville, Arkansas, there would be some similarities but many more differences.
In the beginning of the novel, Abdulrahman Zeitoun is a hard working entrepreneur. He is very kind, always hiring people in need, taking on the most stressful of jobs and getting them done, in my opinion, he is very much like the southern gentlemen where I am from. …show more content…
New Orleans, Louisiana is over a million people, Yellville, Arkansas has barely over a thousand. With smaller towns, everybody knows everybody; there is a sense of security with almost everyone you see on the streets. On one of Zeitoun’s many canoe trips he encounters an elderly couple, Beulah and Alvin Williams, who need help evacuating. Zeitoun tries to get the soldiers in the city to help, but the first group refuses, and the second group promises to come help in an hour but never comes back. Where I am from, the very first group asked would have done anything to help. Everyone in my small town makes it a point to offer the utmost hospitality and in a time of crisis it would only make them offer