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They Sold My Sister

In: English and Literature

Submitted By LineBS
Words 693
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In the story we meet Naiki, who is a twelve-year-old girl that lives in Kenya. She comes from a normal family with a mother, father, brother and sister. They all live in a house in a small village in Kenya. This is where the story takes place. The family is a part of a Maasai tribe. Naliki`s sister is the one that gets sold away, and her name is Nyalo. She goes to junior secondary school at a boarding school, so she has no idea of what arrangement that takes place at home. She is probably only twelve or thirteen years old, circumcised and her breasts were round enough. Because of these signs her father thought she was old enough to get married. The sad thing is that many girls that are deferred to arranged marriages really are this young, or maybe younger. Nyamalo wants to finish school, but if she marries Ole Siravo she will not be allowed to do so. Her parents don’t think school is necessary if she is already married to a rich man. The only two people that understand what she wants are her brother, Tumuka and her sister Naliki. Her brother is great, and he tries to protect her from the marriage. He stands up to his father and says that she must be allowed to finish schooling. Ole Sirayo is the man that Nyamalo gets sold away to. He is an ugly man with big eyes and dilated nostrils like a chimpanzee. The story included one more man, Ole Timau. He is an old man with a beard and a big belly, and he has several other wives, but he thinks he needs one more.

The setting in the short story is based on old traditions and rituals in Kenya, especially in the Maasai tribe. Parent`s in this tribe raise their children like they self were raised, and that is not good because the society has changed. The children in the short story go to school and they have a life that is different from when their parents were young. When girls are deferred to arrange marriages in such

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