Sold

The first thing that caught my attention was when Lakshmi started her period for the first time and had to hide out for seven days till she had been purified. She was told never to look a man in the eye and to never be alone with another man besides her family. This is so different then what I am used to. For starters, there is no purifying done after girls start their period and in America we see that as being disrespectful if you do not look someone in the eye, man or women. Girls and boys are friends and so are men and women, they are treated equal. They must wait to eat till after their husbands have eaten and if he burps, that means you have satisfied him. Women have to have sex with them if he wants to and on his terms. That is not the case in a lot of situations in America. Lakshmi thinks she is doing her family good and working as a maid for a rich family, little does she know what is going to happen to her. Her own step father sells her off and doesn’t even seem guilty or feel bad about it. The mother is sad, but still lets it happen. I know that this is their culture but it still made me sick to my stomach to think about. Women are assigned temporary husbands and must obey to them or else they will get beaten to nearly death and their heads shaved so everyone is aware of the crime they have committed. I can’t imagine being assigned a husband and having to obey his orders, I would of tried to run away I think. I was so proud of Lakshmi when she bit the guys lip as hard as she could and ran off. I knew what was happening right when I read about the red cloth being hung from the door frame and the grunts happening in the rooms. Lakshmi takes beatings for days and even starves herself to protest when finally Mumtaz gives in. She has Ama feed Laksmi this drink that made her in a daze and not aware of what was going on entirely and unable to defend herself. I wanted to puke when reading about her first time with Habib. His nasty comments and how vulgar he was. Habib rapes Lakshmi while she is under this spell and sits there and cries. After Lakshmi had been with men she was no longer a virgin and her cost was lower. She now had to share a room with other women while they were victims of sex trafficking as well. The cost of a coco cola was the same price men paid for her. She had to pay Mumtaz back for everything you can think of an until then, she had to have sex with nasty men to earn this money to do so. Lakshmi finds out that this whole time, the money she made that she thought was going to her family, is going straight to Mumtaz and her family isn’t seeing a rupee. A nice American man comes in and shoes Likshma a bright future where she didn’t have to do these things. He comes back for her and turns out he is a policeman and arrests Mumtaz. I couldn’t feel more relieved for Lakshmi I was so happy for her I wanted to cry. I can’t believe she went through so much at the age of 13 and 14.