As I read the book I was very hesitant in
continuing to read, just because reading about young girl that gets sold into
sexual slavery was not something i looked forward to read. I am a person who
believes that children have rights. The right to have a childhood and have
their basic necessities met. I understand there will be a place where poverty
and hunger live, but its just a hard topic to talk about because where we live
in America we don’t usually hear about this issue.
Sold tells a story of Lakshmi who is thirteen
years old from a very poor village in Nepal. She is sold by her stepfather into
sexual trade. Her mother and her are tricked into thinking that she will be
working as a maid for a rich family. Because no one in her family has ever left
the village they do not know of the dangers of strangers. She travels though
villages not knowing where her destination is crossing the border from Nepal to
India. She is sold and does not realize she has been sold for sexual trade
until the moment has come to “work”. She later has a set mind of working for her
freedom, but is only cheated and debt to Mumtaz the owner of the brothel, who’s
only plans are to use her until she is no longer useful or has gotten a
disease. She learns that working for her freedom is not an option at all and
seek for the help of an American who says will take her to a better, clean
place. Sold ends in her finally getting the courage to elide to leave the
brothel and take a chance of possibility.
Reading the book I thought that Lakshmi was
very mature for her age and understood a lot of things in regards to directing
other people and showing respect to others, and knowing what is more important.
By reading the book alone I could see that women are not valued and are only
worth the amount of money that they bring into the family. Their work is not
recognized and women do not speak up. I know I would have trouble living in an
environment where women are not valued in any way.
In the book there was a girl named Monica who
was working to pay off her debt and when she finally did she returned home, but
it wasn’t long before she returned to the brothel on her own will. Many of
these women if they get the chance to go back to their hometown are rejected by
their families. Monica’s father beat her so she would not go back, and they
begged her not to return since it would disgrace their family. Reading this was
so hard to picture, because she had finally worked for her debt and her family
did not want her back.
I have read throughout this story that brothels
are organized and have become successful because ether take advantage of these
young girls and their families. They go to families who are in very desperate
needs and traffic girls from other countries to make it easier to keep them in
the new country. Where there is little that girls can do to escape. For one
they do not know the language, location and customs of people. And if they do
try to escape their are men who look for the girls and beat them and mark them
by cutting a chunk of their hair and that way if they try to escape again they
will be returned to the brothel. It is a horrible thing that happens to theses
innocent girls.
It relieves me a little that there are people
working to save these young girls from brothels and also victims are shown that
they can have a life after their experience. That there are efforts being made
to educate families and young girls about the dangers of the strangers going to
recruit them for work.
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