Chapter 24

The villagers return to the village and they seem a little mad. Actually really mad. The women and children are afraid to even great them. When Enzima and Obierika visit Okonkwo they notice whip marks on his back. He can't get any sleep because of anxiety. Another tribe meeting is caled the next morning to decide what should be done about the white man. Then Okonkwo acts dumb again. He decides that he will attack the Christians no matter what the tribe says. I would probably wait to see what the tribe is doing before I run in there alone to get slaughtered, but hey that's just me. I think that when Okonkwo does show up at the meeting he may sway some of the people through his obvious passion for the tribe and they will go to fight the missionary. The description of the war dress that Okonkwo has on sort of reminds me of what a native american may where into battle. Anyway a man talks about how much the church has done to their tribe and they need to stand up, but then district messengers come and tell them to stop the meeting immediatly. As soon as they say this Okonkwo just macks him with his machete and kills him with two strokes. The villagers end the meeting and let the messengers escape which isn't what Okonkwo was hoping for, but he just wipes the blood from his machete and departs anyway. I have no idea what to expect from chapter 25. I think maybe the Christians will kill off the tribe because of what Okonkwo did.

Chapter 23

Well it's not exactly an all out war, but we're getting there. The district commisioner wants to meet with the leaders who have been arming themselves and their people for several days in case of an attack. They go to the meeting as friends with only macthetes. They are dumb. As soon as they set the machetes down they are captured and thrown in jail with a bail of 250 bags of cowries or else. The town calls an emergency meeting where everyone goes. They agree that they will pay the bail price. Who knows maybe there is a little hope that after the bail is payed there will be peace and forgiving, but I wouldn't bet on it. I think that the Umuofians will capture one or more of the Christians. The story about the leaders sort of reminded me of the story of the African tribe of Zulu where they had a dance off against the whites. The Zulus broke it down and the whites.......shot them. Sometimes people are so naive. I would have brought some warriors along with me if I were the leaders and all I had were some machetes. I think that the relationship between the two communities could go either way, but I still think it's leaning towards the war side. I don't know though. Maybe there is some hope for the people of Umuofia and the Christians.

Chapter 22

Well it looks like I was completely wrong in predicting that the two communities can live together. I was WAY off. Of course a strict mean man replaced Mr. Brown and of course tensions grew and were unbearable when a zealous convert, Enoch, dared to unveil an egwugwu. Everyone in the village was made at him for this and the egwugwu burn his compound down the day after. As a result of the actions of Enoch, the egwugwus confront Reverand James Smith in front of the church and wish to burn the church down to rid the village of Enoch's sin. Reverand Smith says that he will stand his ground, but his words were changed by the interpreter to make them not sound so offensive and save him from possible punishment. Turns out it didn't really matter what he said because the egwugwus burnt down the church anyway. Gee it looks like things are going just GREAT. I really think now that this will be the end of one of the communities because this is just a little out of hand and I have the feeling a holy war is going to break out and some people are gonna get slaughtered. At least the tribe isn't wimpy anymore which is good news for Okonkwo but maybe a war will break out and Okonkwo will die or something like that.

Chapter 21

The relationship between Umuofia and the Christians is better explained in this chapter. Instead of the mission taking down the tribe it seems like they work off of each other. The missionary uses the tribe's people to teach and the tribe trades with the whites and brings tons of wealth into the village. There are a hospital and a school built near to village where many of the youth go to school. The leaders of each community meet often and talk to each other about what they want and try to learn about each other's religions. Things seem to go well, but Okonkwo is not being welcomed home like he wanted to be. His daughters are attracting many men, but no one really pays any attention to Okonkwo. Mr. Brown, the leader of the missionary, comes to tell Okonkwo that Nwoye is going to become a teacher, but Okonkwo being the guy he is threatens Mr. Brown and not long afterwards Mr. Brown leaves the missionary. It really seems like the two communities may be able to survive together but I think that eventually the tribe will be takne over by Christianity, but the actual tribe will stay intact. Okonkwo can't get his sons initiated which irritates him and he longs for the manly tribe he once was a part of. Okonkwo could be the person who holds the tribes fate in his hands because if he ticks off the missionaries enough violence may occer and tear the people apart once again and with Mr. Brown gone I'm not entirely sure how things are going to play out.

Chapter 20

Okonkwo makes plans for a bigger and better compound than he had before and to marry two more girls. He also plans for his daughters to marry in Umuofia as a plan to help him regain his status as a power in his tribe. Okonkwo has all these high hopes of regaining everything he lost and gaining even more than he left with but when he returns he finds Umuofia very different than when he left. It had experienced trauma from the Christian missionaries stealing their youth. Okonkwo once again wants to be manly and fight the missionary through violence but they are unable to do so because the people are doubtful in the ability of the tribe to do so and if they can even get anyone to stand up to them because so many have already allied themselves with the Christians. What I don't get though is why the people have gone to the missionary becasue the white men have treated the people so badly. It makes me wonder why they would want to join them because they have hanged people just for breaking their laws and are arrogant and shrewd. I'm almost 100% positive that this will lead to the destruction of the whole entire tribe. I'm really starting to not like the story anymore. It seems rather boring now because I've seen it coming for quite some time now.

Chapter 19

Finally Okonkwo's exile is over. He holds a feast of thanks for all of his family. He acts like he is deeply thankful but he really is unhappy that he wasted the chance to gain status and influence in his own clan and wasted time with a womanly clan. This just deepens my dislike for him because he is so ungrateful to his family for basically accepting him when no one else was going to for 7 whole years. Everyone at the feast seems to be so happy to have met Okonkwo and two men praise him greatly. One problem is in Umuofia's near future. THat is the loss of some of its youth to Christianity. Many young people are leaving tradition and most importantly their families in order to pursue worshiping God. This chapter did two things for me. It made me hate Okonkwo just that much more and it validated even more my theory that Umuofia is going to be in pretty deep trouble in the future as a result of them giving the Christians land. Even though it was in the Evil Forest.

Chapter 18

It seems that the new church is gaining momentum against Umuofia even though it is only gathering the outcasts and those without any social status. It has many members now but the church is almost split because of the outcasts joining up in the church but the head missionary calms everyone down and things proceed like normal. One of the Christians says that he has killed the sacred python. Okonkwo is enraged by this and pleads with the elders to go in and kill them all, but the elders decide to ostracize them instead. Once again Okonkwo thinks the tribe is wimpy. That seems to be his excuse for everything. Everytime something doesn't go his way it seems to be wimpy or womanly. Sometimes I think he needs to man up and look at himself and change his ways because the way he acts is no good for anyone and especially for himself. Then all of a sudden the guy who said he killed the python dies and the Christians lose all of their momentum because Umuofia is once again faithful in their gods after this death. To me it just seems like a coincidence but I still think that it is going to be a long struggle between the Christians and the tribe. It might possibly end in violence. Who knows?