Unit 16 Objective Proficiency Listening practice with subtitles: NEA Big Read: Meet Ray Bradbury

HIDDEN NUANCES: CONTEMPORARY POETRY

HIDDEN NUANCES: CONTEMPORARY POETRY:

Chimamanda Ngozi: Purple Hibiscus

pages 31-32

(...) “Yes sah! Tank sah!” They   dash out of to run or go somewhere very quickly because you are in a hurry the compound, laughing loudly.

Kevin and Sunday unpacked the foodstuffs while Jaja and I unpacked the suitcases

from the Mercedes. Mama went to the backyard with Sisi to put away the cast iron

cooking tripods. Our food would be cooked on the gas cooker inside the kitchen, but the

metal tripods would balance the big pots that would cook rice and stews and soups for

visitors. Some of the pots were big enough to fit a whole goat. Mama and Sisi hardly did

any of that cooking; they simply stayed around and provided more salt, more Maggi

cubes, more utensils, because the wives of the members of our umunna came over to do

the cooking. They wanted Mama to rest, they said, after the stress of the city. And every

year they took the leftovers—the fat pieces of meat, the rice and beans, the bottles of soft

drink and maltina and beer—home with them afterward. We were always prepared to

feed the whole village at Christmas, always prepared so that none of the people who

came in would leave without eating and drinking to what Papa called a reasonable level

of satisfaction. Papa’s title was omelora, after all, The One Who Does for the

Community. But it was not only Papa who received visitors; the villagers trooped to

every big house with a big gate, and sometimes they took plastic bowls with firm

covers. It was Christmas.

Jaja and I were upstairs unpacking when Mama came in and said, “Ade Coker

came by with his family to wish us a merry Christmas. They are on their way to Lagos.

Come downstairs and greet them.”    (...) HOVER THE HIGHLIGHTED WORD WITH THE MOUSE IF YOU NEED TO SEE ITS MEANING.

Chimamanda Ngozi: Purple Hisbiscus

Ade Coker was a small, round, laughing man. Every time I saw him, I tried to imagine him writing those editorials in the Standard; I tried to imagine him defying the soldiers. And I could not. He looked like a stuffed doll, and because he was always smiling, the deep dimples in his pillowy cheeks looked like permanent fixtures, as though someone had sunk a stick into his cheeks. Even his glasses looked dollish: they were thicker than window louvers an opening in a door or window that has one or more slanted strips, tinted a strange  bluish having a blue tinge; slightly blue. shade, and framed in white plastic. He was throwing his baby, a perfectly round copy of himself, in the air when we came in. His little daughter was standing close to him, asking him to throw her in the air, too.

HOVER THE HIGHLIGHTED WORDS WITH THE MOUSE IF YOU NEED TO SEE THEIR MEANINGS

Chimamanda Ngozi: Purple Hisbiscus

“What is he doing in my house? What is Anikwenwa doing in my house?” The enraged timber in Papa’s voice made my fingers cold at the tips. Se me quedaron heladas las puntas de mis dedos Jaja and I dashed to the window, and because we could see nothing, we dashed out to the verandah and stood by the pillars. Papa was standing in the front yard, near an orange tree, screaming at a wrinkled old man in a torn white singlet con una camiseta Blanca rasgada and a wrapper wound round his waist. A few other men stood around Papa. “What is Anikwenwa doing in my house? What is a worshiper of idols un adorador de ídolos doing in my house? Leave my house!” “Do you know that I am in your father’s age group, gbo?” the old man asked. The finger he waved in the air was meant for Papa’s face, but but it only hovered around his chest.permanecía en su pecho “Do you know that I sucked my mother’s breast when your father sucked his mother’s?” “Leave my house!” Papa pointed at the gate. Two men slowly ushered Anikwenwa out of the compound. dos hombres acompañaron a Anikwerwa fuera del recinto He did not resist; he was too old to, anyway. But he kept looking back and throwing words at Papa. “Ifukwa gi! You are like a fly blindly following a corpse into the grave!Eres como una mosca siguiendo ciégamente un cadaver hasta la tumba. I followed the old man’s unsteady gait el inestable paso del viejo until he walked out through the gates. 40

HOVER THE HIGHLIGHTED WORDS OR SENTENCES WITH THE MOUSE IF YOU NEED TO SEE THEIR MEANINGS

What I've learned today from Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi 01

Page 44 They were quizzical you look in a way that shows that you are surprised or amused eyes, eyes that asked many questions and did not accept many answers. conceptexcellence.blogspot.com Page 42 “What did you do there? Did you eat food sacrificed to idols? Did you desecrate to deliberately damage or insult sth/sn. your Christian tongue?” Page 57 “Has the devil asked you all to go on errands for him?” The Igbo words burst out of Papa’s mouth. “Has the devil built a tent in my house?” He turned to Mama. “You sit there and watch her desecrate to deliberately damage or insult sth/sn. the Eucharistic fast, maka nnidi?”

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