The next section of Boo’s book carries us even farther into
the characterization of the slum dwellers. We see that many are economically
and politically minded, and the story of Asha’s cunning and Abdul’s mother’s
self-mindedness made for interesting stories. That is how they seem to be,
based on the way they are presented-stories. There is no way the author was
able to be present for the airport thieving sessions of Sunil, or in everyone’s
hut at just the right time and the right place, so I am curious about how she
strung together this book and what she was given to go off of. I must remind
myself that these characters are real, live people, and that their desperate
stories are true. I am most saddened by the fact that they live so near a hub
of wealth and culture, but they are forced to pick up scraps because no one at
the airport will care to give them more than a dirty glance. Maybe this is a
point Boo is trying to get at-we see only what we want to see, whether that is
a person to be used for our own political gain, as in Asha’s case, or the
hoards of people who see the slum dwellers as garbage, not as people.
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