800 Word Essay

This essay will about the perspectives of Abdul, Asha and Sunil who are characters from the book “behind the beautiful forevers” what was written by Katherine Boo. Abdul, Asha and Sunil come from a place in Mumbai which is called Annawadi. Annawadi is a slum and all 3 characters live close by but because of their personalities and status they all have different perspectives on the slum. Abdul and Sunil are both young boys who are friends and make their money of scavenging and selling what they find for a small profit where as Asha is a fully grown women with kids, she is also a potential slum Lord. But for a living Asha makes her income off of fraud. Abdul is young boy who is from one of few Muslim family’s in Annawadi and they are sort of seen as an outcast family. They are seen as outcast because of how Annawadi’s people are bought up to be Hindu’s. The Hindus in Annawadi also don’t like how Abdul makes his money because he is a Muslim living of Hindu money. Sunil is very similar to Abdul but Sunil is a Hindu Sunil has the same way of making money as Abdul which means his thoughts on making money in Annawadi is the same as Abdul’s.

Asha is a character also seen as an outcast because of how her family have immigrated from the north to the south. Asha makes her money off of fraud and see’s Mumbai as a “hive” for a “profitable collary”. this metaphor suggests that Mumbai is a place where people go to worship money just like how the bees go to the hive to worship the queen bee. this suggests that Asha thinks of Mumbai as a place to make money. Because of her wealth compared to most of the Hindu families Asha is a potential slumlord. This could make her image even worse because the Hindus could easily start to realise that someone from the north is really only in the  south to make money off their people.

Abdul doesn’t think of Annawadi in the same way as Asha but this could easily be because of the way they make money. Abdul has to make his money off the garbage of the rich which gives us an uninspiring impression of the slum. This gives us an inspiring because making money of garbage is a very unattractive job. Asha, however, makes her money off fraud. This is a better way of making money because there is more money to be made. this is seen when Katherine Boo says “Everything around us is roses and we’re the shit in between”. This is a metaphor. It is clear that when Abdul says “everything”, he is directing the reader towards the new skyscraper buildings in Mumbai, and how more than 1/4 of the country’s income is going to the rich. When he says “shit in between” he is talking about how the poor people in Annawadi basically live off the scraps of waste. The word roses makes the reader think of pleasant things such as plesent smells and feeling like luxury. Whereas roses have connotations which are pleasant, shit has unpleasant connotations. We associate shit with unpleasant smells and a feeling of disgust. The slum has been classed as negative in the book before, when Katherine Boo labels the slum as “bitty”. In this quotation the word bitty suggests that the slum is very dirty and cheap.

Sunil sees Mumbai as a necessary evil, it’s a place that he doesn’t like but he has to convince himself that he enjoys the city in order to survive. Sunil tells us that “he’d have to become a better scavenger” to “jump start” his system. However, there is a huge risk that he’ll “wreck” his body due to the dangers that a more intense level of scavenging can bring. Katherine Boo uses imagery to highlight this idea. She tells us that “lice colonised hair, inched up fingers and calves swelled into tree trunks”. This imagery allows us to understand the severity of his injuries due to scavenging.

In conclusion, Katherine Boo shows the reader that very different and very similar people can have different perspectives on a place. Abdul and Sunil are similar because of the way make money, this makes their perspective on the slum the same because they both want to break out of Annawadi. Asha, however, is different because she has enough money to go and live away but she would rather make money off Annawadi. Overall, Katherine Boo shows that a Mumbai slum is a place just like our own London because of how people from the less wealthy areas want to break out into the big time, just like the quote “a hive for a profitable collary”.