Exploring the Village of Umuofia

During my first visit to the village of Umuofia, I was struck at the differences in the buildings in the village.

The first building I went to visit was the Meeting Hall. It appears like it was built by the people and was made with materials that were native to the area. I remember the book saying that the weather there was hot and dry for a portion of the year and rainy for another portion, therefore it makes sense that the building would be close to the ground and have such a large covering.

I decided to enter the Meeting Room and was amazed at how detailed it was compared to the appearance of the Meeting Hall from the outside. The Meeting Room has intricate painting on the walls and what I am assuming are gods in the center and corners of the room. It also appears like there is seating the the people who come to meet.

I then thought it was interesting to view the Christian Mission. It is built with different materials and has walls on the sides. It also has a front section with an overhang which I assume is the entrance. The building seems to have a solid foundation and more diversified construction than the Meeting Hall. As I thought about these differences, it made sense to me that this building would be different than the Meeting Hall because the missionaries arrived a long while after the Ibo people had settled and probably brought their ideas about the construction of buildings with them.

The final building that I looked at was the District Commissioner's Headquarters. This building, to me, seems the most advanced. It has two levels and a staircase. There are square windows and pillars to support the building. The thatched roof is still present, but that is about the only thing that truly signifies that this is a building in Africa.

Things Fall Apart

When I began reading Things Fall Apart, I started to dread the assignment. The simple language and the diverseness of the culture (many hard-to-pronounce names), as well as the slow plot, signaled a slow read for me. However, as I trudged on in the book, the plot got better and I found myself curious to find out how the story would end.

When I reached the second half, I felt like there was a sudden turn. The Christians arrived and the Ibo people were all shook up. As a Christian myself, I was curious how they would be portrayed and how the Ibo people would react. I wasn't surprised when the Ibo people began to resist their arrival, nor that some of the Ibo people broke from their villages and families and converted to Christianity.

I did not suspect, however, that the ending would occur as it did. Things truly did fall apart for the family of Okonkwo and the Ibo people. Even though he had received help from friends and neighbors to change his life earlier, in the end he made choices that he later regreted and I think it finally hit him that he never would be the successful man he dreamed of, not with 2 murders to his name.

Because the arrival of the Christians changed the tone of the novel, I decided to find out more about the Christian missionary influence in Nigeria. Apparently Christianity was introduced by Catholic priests who arrived with traders and officials at Benin along the West African coast in the 1800s to serve the Portugese community and a small number of African converts, but left when the Portugese did and then was reintroduced later by the British Church of England Church Missionary Society and were followed by other Christian groups.

I was also amazed to find in my search a blog about 2 missionary families that had to leave Nigeria in 2006 after having been there since 1920 because the people there threatened to kill them and ended up destroying their village and killing many of their people.