Content Warning: This section of the guide refers to xenophobia, enslavement, other violence, and challenges faced by immigrants.

Math, numbers, and word problems symbolize the difficult real-life challenges that Vali faces. Vali is continuously faced with obstacles that seem impossible to overcome, especially with the few tools and money she carries with her. She repeatedly tries to turn her actual problems into math games, hoping to make the problems seem fun, simple, and solvable. However, doing this only highlights how impossible some of the problems are, given her limited information and resources. She considers issues like how much further they need to walk, how long they can survive on their remaining water, and how fast they should jump onto a moving train. At times, she can solve a basic problem such as how many miles they need to walk, but this is not the same thing as actually walking those miles, so the challenge is not really “solved” by completing the word problem. Other challenges, such as how fast they should jump onto the train, are beyond Vali’s ability to compute, and she has to simply make her best guess with the information she has. In this sense, math, numbers, and word problems sometimes highlight

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