"like a poor, frightened bat" (Simile)
When a new girl enters Happiness House, Lakshmi observes she is "clenching her feet inside her new shoes like a poor frightened bat clinging to a branch.” For Lakshmi and the nameless new girl, both entering the Happiness House and wearing shoes were novel, painful experiences. The girl's visible tension and distress remind Lakshmi of a bat clinging to a branch—a familiar, rural image.
"black rimmed tiger eyes" (metaphor)
The women in the brothel apply makeup to Lakshmi's face. When she appraises her appearance, Lakshmi feels like a different person, with "black-rimmed tiger eyes, a mouth red as a pomegranate, and flowing hair like the tiny gold-pants woman in the TV." Initially, Lakshmi feels beautiful and powerful, like a tiger, and glamourous, like a movie star. At this point in the narrative, she does not understand her role in the Happiness House.
"A thundering beast" (Metaphor)
Lakshmi's mountain home is a place of exquisite natural beauty. Yet, the environment that captivates Lakshmi also presents a great danger. When the monsoon comes, the life-giving river turns “into a thundering beast" that sweeps away the family's rice crops.
"the way letters turn into words" (Simile)
When Lakshmi first arrives in the city, she is overwhelmed by the chaos. However, she soon recognizes patterns and explains that by analyzing the city, "chaos turns into order the way letters turn into words." Lakshmi applies what she learns in school to an unfamiliar situation to make sense of order; the city's component parts, such as people and cars, form a whole that conveys meaning—much like how letters, when taken out of context, are meaningless until they are arranged into words.
"like trying to clutch a handful of fog" (Simile)
In the brothel, Lakshmi maintains her hope and sanity by remembering her home. However, as her traumatic experiences accumulate, she struggles to remember home and forget the horrors of the brothel. She compares remembering home to "trying to clutch a handful of fog," a futile, impossible task. Forgetting the abuses done to her is also impossible, "like trying to hold back the monsoon." Lakshmi knows from the previous monsoon season that a monsoon is unstoppable and wreaks havoc.
