When I read the first story I saw some very interesting similarities between the girls when it came to the way they were treated and looked down upon. They were both of different backgrounds and heritages but they still were not white. Many people looked down on them and treated them like dirt. The Native American girl even said she felt as if she were a toy, so here they obviously were not seeing her as an equal human being. The differences seemed to be the social level of the families at least at the beginning of the "Leaves from the Mental Portfolio of a Eurasian", the family seems a bit well off. Whereas the Indian families did not seem so lucky.
The thing that bothered me the most when looking at these stories is the treatment of the girl in the first story, "The Schooldays of an Indian Girl", when they cut her hair I feel that that was a big blow. The Indian culture prides themselves in their hair and do not wear it short unless, I believe she says, you are a coward. This just showed how much the others did not respect her or where she came from. I also really liked this character though because even after how she is treated, she seems strong. At the end of the story where it talks about her going to college I found that to be a very significant fact. Many people did not go to college back then, especially if they were Native American and female! Then on top of all that she also wins awards! I found that to be just such a neat story.
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Why did you think the Indian family was not "well off"? Was it because their monetary values were not the same and they did not have 'typical' jobs? Just curious. I agree that when she won the speech awards at college it was very important. I think it was really important to the story, because it is a triumph over the prejudice that Native Americans, especially females, could not possibly be intelligent.
I don't really know why I thought this...but it just seemed to form the idea of the other family being better off than the Indian family when i read it. I think I thought because the Eurasian family was able to move across an ocean to the US and seemed to be able to afford somethings that other families may not have been able to...at least in the beginning of that story.
But I dunno...it was just speculation on my case I think. So I could be wrong, thanks for the question though, it got me to think about this a bit more.
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