Hidden Girl: The True Story of a Modern-Day Child Slave Read Free

would these people who complain about going to school get through life?
    Not being able to go to school broke my heart, and I was jealous that my brothers had the opportunity to learn. I was jealous of the entire process, from getting up in the morning and getting dressed, to them coming home in the afternoon to do their homework. Knowing that I would not have the chance to be part of this left me dejected for days. The only thing that pulled me out of it was my younger brothers and sisters.
    From the time I was about five years old I was in charge of our apartment while my mother worked during the day. I helped my mother with the daily tasks of the household: sweeping, washing, cooking, and overseeing my two younger brothers and the first of my younger sisters. My younger siblings were everything to me. They were my world, and I loved them from the bottom of my heart.
    Our mother was often gone all day, and when that happened, she locked us in our one room of the apartment. Then we might play dress-up. We used my mother’s clothes and the clothes of my older sisters, although I’m not sure they ever knew this. We often played hide-and-seek under the blankets on the floor. Or we might play “good guy, bad guy,” which was our equivalent of cops and robbers.
    I’m not sure why our mother locked us in, but I can make a guess. The neighborhood we lived in was not safe. We lived in a center section of town where there were stabbings or shootings every now and then. And from my earliest days I knew not to speak to strangers. The streets were often busy, and there was the usual noise and activity that occurs when many people live close together. Some of that activity was unsavory, and when our mom thought the neighborhood was unsettled and something might happen, she locked us in. Our neighborhood was small, and news traveled fast. If we knew something like that was going on, we stayed inside. On some days when we were playing outside, friends or neighbors suggested that I get my siblings off the street. Then I’d hurry to round them up and take them to our apartment. On safer days we hung out outside, played games on the street, and moved to the side only when a car came by.
    When I wasn’t playing with my brothers and sisters, I kept busy cooking and cleaning. I washed our clothes by hand in a bucket. It was a lot of work, but I washed only the clothes that were absolutely filthy, and it helped that none of us had much to wear. I usually had whatever I was wearing, plus a T-shirt and pants, and then a dress for holidays. All of our clothes were hand-me-downs, and by the time the clothes got to me, they were pretty worn. But I didn’t mind. No one in our neighborhood had a lot; I was no different from anyone else I knew.
    We usually had food for dinner, but not always. When we had food, it was rice or bread, and once in a while, meat. If there was money for a few potatoes, we went to a market some distance away to get them. When we got home, my mom would boil the potatoes and we’d share them for dinner. On a good day my mother would make a special recipe of grape leaves stuffed with rice. (Recipe in the back of the book!) Even though my mother often had to modify it because we did not have all of the ingredients, this was a treat!
    Most days we ate two meals, and occasionally we might have had fruit or vegetables similar to those eaten here in the United States. I do know that I felt hungry during much of my childhood.
    While I was glad to have food, I was even happier on the rare occasions when I got to take a shower. We had only one bathroom for the four apartments in our building, so bathing was not a regular thing. Our bathroom had to be shared by more than twenty people, and a portable heater warmed our water. On top of that we had to have money to buy oil to heat the water and had to carry all of our water, including our drinking and bathing water, from a well that was a long distance from our apartment. This was