Slavery Depicted In Shyima's Book, Hidden Girl

Imagine being sold into slavery at the age of eight, losing track of time, getting smuggled into the United States at the age of ten, getting freed by the age of thirteen, learning English at the age of thirteen, and having to live with the internal and external scars of slavery. This was the life of Shyima Hall. Her book Hidden Girl was the story of her bondage, escape, and life after the terror. I couldn’t imagine any of this, but this was and still is a common event in Egypt. Slavery is a terrible concept that goes on daily and still is not gone. People are getting illegally smuggled into the United States and only two percent of people get rescued. Hall was denied proper nutrition, medical care, education, and her childhood. The biggest
Hall wrote,”...but then it dawned on me that my captors knew that in the United States my position in the household was not acceptable,” (49). I think that she noticed everything, when guests came she was to go in the cupboard and she had to stay hidden. Having any form of slavery in a household is illegal and she knew that. I hate the idea of slavery and holding a teen girl in a home is absurd. Her captors were aware and also the people on the street that saw and questioned her strange behavior. I feel that she knew it was wrong, knew everything was wrong in the world but she had no one to turn to.
Before reading this book, ending slavery seemed like an extremely difficult task. Hall wrote,”It takes only a single phone call to put steps into action that could rescue someone like me,” (216). After reading this quote, I realized that a small action can change a person's life and it takes the world one step closer to abolishing slavery. I believe that one action can change someone’s life and this one phone call could save a person from the terror that they lived in while enslaved. Hall was part of the 2% that was rescued. She was rescued because of an anonymous phone