Michael StricklandEmily ChamisonEnglish 11021 May 2014Transition to AdulthoodIn Life of Pi by Yann Martel, the main character is Pi Patel, a 16-year-old boy who grows up in a zoo in Pondicherry, India, with his brother and parents. As he grows up, Pi continually tries to discover who he really is. During his family's move from Pondicherry, India to Toronto, Canada, Pi is forced to change his mindset and mature in order to survive. Pi journeys through rebellion and loss of innocence, but never gains the acceptance he desires. Pi begins his transition to adulthood with rebellion and exploration. In the novel Life of Pi, Pi rebels as a child by freely and openly worshiping three completely separate religions at the same time. In India this is absolutely against the norm. Worshiping all these different religions at once is his way of rebelling against the social expectations of Indian culture; Pi just does his thing. On page 71, Martel writes, “They did not know that I was a practicing Hindu, Christian, and Muslim,” speaking of the leaders of all three different religions. Pi never told the pandit, priest or imam about his multi-religious practices. Once the three leaders discover his religious practice, they confront Pi and his family over the matter at hand. Pi once again rebels against the system by quoting Gandhi: “Bapu Gandhi said: 'All religions are true.' I just want to love God," I blurted out and looked down, red in the face," (Martel 76), showing how Pi's purpose of worshiping more than one religion is just to worship God. Pi is trying to explain to these religious figures and the his parents how to love God should not require religious affiliation. Having said that it seemed to silence... middle of paper...... is the original animal story the truth? Was the story of the animals simply Pi's making the truth seem better by hiding his rebellion and loss of innocence by giving people animalistic descriptions so he would seem human? Pi just wanted to be accepted by Japanese men and everyone who would listen to his story and he needed to know that no one would ever understand his primitive and savage actions of killing and eating humans while on the lifeboat. To reach full maturity one must face the difficult transition to adulthood. Even though Pi has gone through his loss of innocence and rebellion, as he has never achieved complete acceptance, I don't think he has reached adulthood, he will continually live in doubt and relentlessly seek acceptance from those around him to because of the events that occurred in his youth.