The Orphanage and Plankton Factory

When Matt finally escapes the big house, he finds himself in an orphanage with other boy around his age. They all ended up in there the same way Matt did, trying to cross the border between Opium and Aztlan and losing their parents in the process. Matt than finds himself doing work in the orphanage and being bossed around by the keeper, Raul. This is sort of what it was like back in the house, being kept prisoned until El Patron rescued him. Of course later being betrayed by El Patron and almost dying. However things seem to be different for Matt in the orphanage. Unlike when he was in the big house, he isn’t hated here. In fact, most of the boys look up to Matt. Now this is probably because they don’t know that he is a clone, but it seems to me that even if they do figure out, some of them may still like Matt. This is probably because even though people think of him as different person, his personality is still the same. As Matt’s friendship grows stronger though, the keeper, Raul, is starting to hate him even more and thinks of Matt as an “Aristocrat.”  Later, Matt and a couple of his friends are transported to a plankton factory in San Luis. Here they grow plankton and Matt finds out that Aztlan uses plankton for pretty much any food. They use plankton in hotdogs, hamburgers, burritos, and even milk! To me, this is just plain gross. Matts job here was to help tend and grow the plankton, he was also ordered to help gather salt from giant salt mountains that were left behind after a lake dried up. Now obviously this isn’t the life that Matt expected he would find when he left Opium. In Opium and in the big house, Matt was treated like royalty. He could eat anything, get anything, and go anywhere he wanted to without being asked not to. Here in the plankton factory the keepers treat him like slaves. To me, it doesn’t seem as different in the plankton factory than when Matt was kept by Rosa.