women in India and homeless bird

1. Selina Janmohamed Grade 4 February 20,2013 women in India and homeless bird

2. Summary of Homeless Bird Homeless Bird is about a thirteen year old girl that lives in India named Koly. Her maa and baap want her to have an arranged marriage. Koly felt devastated because of this arranged marriage. When she went to her husband’s house, she saw that the house was bigger and better than hers.

3. Summary Continued The wedding day was hard to prepare. There was tons of food. Koly was wearing a sari with silver earings. The next day, she found out that her husband was going to die if they did not take him to Varanasi, which is the holy city where they spread ashes in the Ganges River. Hari her husband told her, that he only married Koly because of the money. Hari’s parents did not want Koly, just the dowry. Since Koly is Hari’s wife, she has to be like his servant.

4. Summary Continued They took him to Varanasi. Hari thinks if he died in Varanasi, he would be lucky because that is where the Sacred Ganges River is. After he floated in the Ganges River, he did not get better. Hari died leaving Koly to be a widow. Chandra, Hari’s sister is getting married. They went to Vrindavan because Sass abanded Koly and Koly also got married with Raji. Koly lived a happy life with Raji

5. My claim Homeless Bird shows that some women have tough situations in India.

6. Evidence In India , Hindu women have to make food for everybody each morning to night. Koly in Homeless Bird, had to wake up each morning and take the cows out to the field and get water from the well, which shows that she is challenged like most women.

7. Evidence Women become widows after their husbands die. Koly in Homeless Bird was a widow when Hari died. Her mother-in-law treated her very badly by bossing her around. She was very tired each hour of every day.

8. Evidence Women in India can get married more than once. If they are widowed, then they can get married again. Koly first got married with Hari, and after Hari died, she got married to Raji. She will suffer if Rajidies because she will be a widow again.

9. Evidence Women have to give a dowry, which can be valuable objects given to the husband’s family. Before getting married, Koly had to sell a lot of stuff to get the dowry for Hari’s family. It is very hard to sell personal objects and to get the dowry.

10. Evidence In India, women have to take care of their children. They also have to be their husband’s servant. It is challenging because Koly has to go to the Varanasi to spread Hari’s ashes. While there, she saw many kids suffering. In family life, most women have a very hard time with their family members not treating them right. Some women are happy with their family and do not do much as other women.

11. Evidence When Hari died, Koly had to do everything on her own. When Sass kept on asking her to do too much for her, she could barely move from being tired. It relates to India because when men die, women also have to be on their own like Koly.

12. Conclusion Homeless Bird shows that it relates to India in many ways. One important way is about women and how they are treated by their people. Homeless Bird tells us the most important parts of India. Young adults have arranged marriages which is in their culture. An arranged marriage is a marriage that your parents prepare for you and you have to respect the marriage. India is a severe place to live in because of what they consider values .

13. Story Reflection When I finished the book, Homeless Bird, I found it was a very challenging book because there were many hard words, and at some point, it’s hard to understand . I noticed that women in India have tough living situations and a handful of women are pushed to arranged marriages. Last, I noticed that it is very hard when women are widows and their mother-in-laws treat them very bad. I wonder if there would be a Homeless Bird part two.

14. Sources • Homeless Bird • Indian readings : women's responsibilities, The many faces of India and From the land and sea • Wikipedia