In the chapter, The Letter, Marjane tells an interesting idea about social class discrimination, which occurred during her childhood. The story begins when Marjane's maid, Mehri, had to leave her parents to work in her house. Mehri's parents did this to her, eventhough she was only eight years old, because they had so many children that they couldn't support them all. Years after she worked with Marjane's parents, she began to live normally as the other girls. Marjane's parents treated her nicely and fairly as if she was their own child. However, the problem came when she was about to marry a man next door. Under Shah's law, they couldn't get married due to their social classes. During that time, people must stay within their own social class (pg. 33-39).
I think this chapter is interesting because the story is very related to my country. In Indonesia, many people, who live in traditional way, believe that the more children they have, the wealthier they will be. Until today, these poor-uneducated people keep having more babies, even though they can't support them. To make ends meet, their parents ask their children to beg for money. When they are big enough, they would be asked to work as maids with low salaries. Maid is the most common job for uneducated people in Indonesia, and it considers as low class people. From my own experience, many of my overseas friends wouldn't believe that I have three maids in my house, in Indonesia. Do you think that my parents are millionaires? Absolutely not. In average, they are paid very low and sometimes I feel very unfair. They work eighteen hours a day, 7 days a week, and they only get 250,000 rupiahs, which is only US $25 a month. Sometimes they are treated very badly by their bosses, and worst, sometimes they got abused because they are maid, which is consider as low class people. This discrimination still occur in Indonesia until today. I feel really bad about them both whom got low payments and whom got abused by their bosses. Fortunately, my parents are not one of those people who look down on maid. I was taught by my parents to respect them as they are. Their job are so helpful that they should be treated well. I really love one of my maid, who took care of me since I was born, just like Marjane had. We should be grateful that there is no such thing as social discrimination in the United States.
Work Cited:
Satrapi, Marjane. Persepolis. New York: Pantheon, 2003
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