1) I believe the stolen beef and then the Jell-O back at her pueblo at the end of the story signify the present state of existence of the woman as the “Yellow Woman” and then her normal persona. After she parted ways with Silva, she kicked the horse loose near the river and watched him disappear in the distance with the sacks of stolen meat swinging back and forth. The fact that she was also essentially stolen from her normal world by the ka’tsina bears significance here, for as the stolen meat goes, so does the Yellow Woman. She returns to her home and her normal family which is busy preparing the Jell-O upon her return.

2) Based on Arab-Islamic culture, the Al-Fargani father was a part of a world that was driven by male power brokers and had no real place for women outside the household. In this culture a man cannot live after his honor has been removed because no man will respect him. In this type of culture, it is regular practice to put one’s daughter or sister to death when she has been with another man outside of marriage. Her father tried to warn Leila beforehand that it was not her place to enter politics for these reasons but he was unable to sway her. It appears as though the whole stigma of the situation had gotten the better of him, and he was not able to take a power stance against the situation in order to attempt to bring about change.

3) What I believe is meant here is that the senator felt vulnerable as his death was slowly nearing. As he was forced to deal with this all-too-real reality, he became struck by the beauty of Laura Farina and resolved to embrace her love. This would prove to be at the cost of his own political reputation which became tarnished upon the revelation of his affair with her. But he cared more for her than he did about this reputation. The irony of the senator’s death is that he was not able to leave behind a name that was rendered in keepsake with the people because of the affair, and despite his indulgence he was not any less prone to his impending death.