I feel bad for Okonkwo

Imagine you growing up in a small town and your father is a drunk that never pays anyone back. Since your father is sleeping all the time and not working, you have to be the one to take care of your family at a very young age. When you grow up of course you don't want to be like your dad! You want to be better because you don't want what happened to you to happen to your kids. You take every precaution not to be like your father; you work hard, you are self-sufficient so no one owes you money, and you raise up this amazing family. Every respects you because of the great man you have become and then your gun explodes and a piece of it kills a kid. Flash forward and you get back home and you try and fight for your rights but then no one agrees with you and you feel like you fell back to the bottom where you started. This is how Okonkwo felt. He tried his whole life not to be the slug his father was. Some can argue Okonkwo is too manly and too harsh, but he has a reason to be. He is scared of becoming his father. Everyone knows what it is like to have their parents do something embarrassing in public, what if that was all the time. Okonkwo was embarrassed to claim him as a father. We, as children, are supposed to learn from our parents' mistakes, and that is exactly what Okonkwo did.

Slave: My True Story

Last year for my independent studies book, I read "Slave: My True Story." This book was written by Mende Nazer and it was about her life before, during, and after she was a slave. When she was 12 years old, a woman about to be married in her world, she was taken by men, raped, and put into slavery. The book tells her chilling story about everything she had to endure. She starts the book off talking about her life back home and explaining it in amazing detail. She remembered perfectly what everything looked like and how everything worked. What made me think about her story was when we were reading about Okonkwo and how his housing system was set up. In Things Fall Apart, the book mentions the many different houses on one man's property. There is the main house for the men, separate houses for the wives and daughters, and living quarters for guests. This was just like Mende described her life in her story. One main difference between the two books is that Catholic missionaries are coming into the Igbo people's land when it was Islamic men invading Mende's tribe. I just thought how interesting it was that the two stories were written so far apart yet the housing systems were the exact same.

This is jaclyns blog post about Beyoncé:

The other day in Humanities, we talked about how Beyonce is a feminist and a voice for the black community. (I literally worship Beyonce. #queen) When Ms. King brought her up the other day in class, I thought I would look into it. Her new song “Formation” (which is my favorite jam currently) is a voice for not only women and blacks, but also LGBTQ people. Omise'eke Natasha Tinsley, a well-versed African and African Diaspora Studies associate professor wrote an article (found at http://time.com/4211888/beyonce-formation-activism/) about Beyonce’s role. Beyonce is celebrating her formation. Everything that has made her who she is: heritage, her fine form, her politics. According to Tinsley, “While some activists call on African Americans to get militant in response to injustice, Beyonce asks ladies to get in formation, to stand side by side and show everyone we’re still here and ‘we gon’ slay, slay <http://www.cosmopolitan.com/ente>.’” The song, then, is all about being a proud African American female. Proud of one’s heritage, body type, natural black hair, and other distinguishing features. The song even has a personal connection to New Orleans, because it features Queen of Bounce Big Freedia (another personal favorite) and the video features an abandoned plantation; Beyonce also says quite literally “Mama Louisiana” and “I Got hotsauce in my bag, swag” since her mother was from Louisiana, and she was raised with southern influences. In conclusion, Beyonce wants to “[unite] dreams, work and power to create a new world—a world where black women own their bodies, pleasures, and possibilities. ‘I dream it, I work hard, I grind ‘til I own it,’ Bey sings, and I believe her.” #SLAYMEBEYONCE #SLAYMEFREEDIA

Okonkwo the Savage

In class today, I was thinking of Achebe's overall goals of this novel. I know that he is trying to portray the true life of the Ibo people as opposed to their stereotypes. However, I think he goes even deeper with this fictional story. I personally believe that Achebe makes Okonkwo represent more of the savage beast that European society think of when they think of Africa. And the rest of the culture is meant to portray the true representation. Generally, the class agrees that Okonkwo is a horrible person and I think Achebe gives us that hatred for him to show the drastic opposition of the likable characters that are the true representation of Ibo society.

Skin Color

In the autobiography that we discussed in class, the man discusses how he lived far from the river when he was a child, so he didn't even know that white people existed. I have experienced this first hand when I went to Haiti last summer. We visited one of the Haitian homes and a fairly young girl started balling crying as soon as she saw us. The family quickly explained that she had never seen white people before and that she was scared. They said not to take it personally, this was her absolute first encounter with white people so she was very shocked at the difference. This is just a crazy concept to me. I can't imagine not knowing of another race for the first few months or years of my life.

Yoruba of the Day

When we were looking at a map of Nigeria the other day with Mrs. Quinet, I noticed "Yoruba" on the map. Eniola's mother speaks yoruba and Eniola went to school to learn it. I wasn't in the class but I know Eniola would put up a "Yoruba of the Day" every day in religion last year. Eniola is a really good friend of mine so I asked her for a phrase so I could make a post about it. She said:
o ko ni pataki ibi ti mo ti emi yoo nigbagbogbo ni re pada
"It doesn't matter where I am, I will always have your back"
I think it is interesting how people with different backgrounds can become so connected--take my friendship with Eniola, for example. I also think it is important to note how strong bonds can be even when you're so far from the other person. This just kind of reminded me of the African family traditions and strong tribal bonds we alluded to when we started talking about Nigeria and TFA.

In God We Trust?

The gods in Things Fall Apart confuse me. It's a strange relationship/trust system between the people and their gods. Usually in religions, it is understood that you are supposed to entirely trust your God no matter what. In the situation with the priestess, they do not fully trust their God. The mother follows the priestess all the way to the cave and then waits outside because she is worried about the child. Okonkwo also shows up and despite what he says I believe that he was also worried about his daughter. If they had had full faith in their gods they wouldn't have worried about the daughter and what the priestess' intentions were.