As soon as I read this, I wondered, well, who is the right type of person? What does that mean? Who is truly prepared to take on a risk that could mean their lives? And did Galina succeed in her attempts to protect Raya? With Galina's resentment and hatred towards Raya, was she even capable of protecting her?
After I finished the reading, I had to step back for a moment to take in everything from the true time frame and perspective of the story. I realized that all that had really occurred during the entire story was Galina's exit from her house and Raya's choice to leave. Everything else was either a flashback or memory from Galina's point of view. Thus, I was led to the conclusion that Galina had not succeeded in her attempts to save Raya. As Galina's hatred for Raya grew, so did Raya's uncomfortableness, ultimately leading to her decision to leave. However, I found it interesting that though Galina often wished ill thoughts about Raya and hoped that awful things would happen to her, when they finally left, Galina panicked and yelled, "What do you mean 'gone'?!"(49). Though Galina may have been anti-semitic and horribly jealous of Raya, she is still a human. I think that all it takes to be "the right type of person" is to be human. Not just to be a human physically, but to be human in nature, emotionally and physically. I think this also explains Galina's reaction at the end of the story. The fact that Raya had really left seemed to leave Galina in the wake of these same human emotions that had prompted her to help Raya in the first place.
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