In the tale of Fa-Mu-Lan, the narrator is given a survival test, where she has to survive a mountain trek without provisions. During that trek, the narrator finds herself weary from hunger. Hunger brings out her animal instincts, because she needs to stay strong to live. "On the fourth and fifth days, my eyesight sharp with hunger, I saw deer and used their trails when our ways coincided. Where deer nibbled, I gathered the fungus, the fungus of immortality" (25). The narrator is forced to search for her food to eat. The hungrier she becomes, the more feral she is. Meat also played a role in the connection between food and strength. During the beginning of her story she claimed she no longer needed meat. After she bec

'Fat women are more beautiful than skinny women'" (118).

Brave Orchid's bitterness toward American culture influenced the narrator. Fat carried not only excess lipids, it carried wealth and power in Brave Orchid's opinion. Women were more beautiful with fat because wealth enabled them to achieve their "beauty". The incessant use of references between strength and eating throughout the book show the narrator was influenced is some manner. The product of the influence may not have been a fat woman, but a woman educated in two cultures.

ame starving, she breaks down and eats meat. "...I saw the rabbit had sacrificed itself for me. It had made me a gift of meat" (26). Her will was eroded by the hunger because as her hunger increased, she became weaker and her resolve was easier to destroy. When the narrator was not starving she was in control of her faculties. Hunger however, strips her even of vision, as she imagines things that do not exist. The narrator says, "Hunger also changes the world when eating can't be habit, then neither can seeing. I saw two people made of gold dancing the earth's axis" (27). Viewing two gold dancers would be wonderful to witness, however the chances are very slim. The hunger had weakened her to the point of confusion, and possibly dilution. Just as hunger weakens a person so they cannot command themselves, eating will make a person powerful and the masters of others.

Some common words found in the essay are:
Woman Warrior, Chen Luan-feng, Brave Orchid, Communists Communists, Brave Orchid's, Wei Pang, Warrior Food, China Kingston, Kao Chung, Moon Orchid, brave orchid, brave orchid's, woman warrior, hunger hunger, tale fa-mu-lan, person powerful, 206 narrator, throughout book, skinny people, themselves relatives,
Approximate Word count = 1269
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)