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All Okonkwo was asking for was a little R-E-S-P-E-C-T. Granted, swinging your machete around may not be the nicest way to ask, but still. The guy deserved better.
Transcript
- 00:05
Things Fall Apart, a la Shmoop. You think you've got daddy issues? Try growing
- 00:11
up with my Pops, Okonkwo < Oh-kawn-kwoh>.
- 00:19
I was never good enough for “Mr. Big Successful Yam Farmer,” no-siree. He was always after
- 00:22
me to be tougher, manlier, and better with power tools. I think he wanted me to be a
- 00:25
mini-version of him, which is certainly rich, because Okonkwo sure didn’t win any “Father
Full Transcript
- 00:32
of the Year” awards.
- 00:34
Need an example? Check this out....Okonkwo sort of inherited this hostage kid from another
- 00:41
tribe…
- 00:41
…which was okay, because Ikemefuna <Ee-keh-meh-foo-nah> turned out to be a pretty cool dude. Dad liked
- 00:46
him, too. In fact, he liked Ike a lot more than he liked me. …
- 00:50
…But that still didn't stop him from going all Texas Chainsaw Massacre when the tribe
- 00:55
decided to kill Ike. You see, Dad didn't want the guys to think he was weak, so he let his
- 01:01
machete do the talking. Nobody really wanted to get on Okonkwo’s bad side after that…
- 01:09
Dad was really big on respect. Is one of your wives talking back to you? Use her for target
- 01:11
practice.
- 01:11
Did a lowly peon dare to disagree with you during a meeting? Call him a lady. Yep, Okonkwo
- 01:11
was quite the charmer. "Nwoye,” (Nuh-woh-yeh) he used to say, "I yam what I yam." Well,
- 01:11
actually I couldn't hear what he said over the sounds of his fist hitting me repeatedly,
- 01:11
but I'm sure he meant something along those lines.
- 01:11
In fact, the only person he gave a fig about, besides the adopted son he sliced in half,
- 01:16
was his daughter Ezinma < Eh-zeen-mah>.
- 01:18
I know, her name sounds like a skin condition, but she's my half-sister, so watch it. When
- 01:24
she got sick, Okonkwo was all, "I'll save you!" and made her a special medicine. The
- 01:30
guy never so much as gave me a Band-Aid. But karma finally caught up with Okonkwo when
- 01:38
he shot a kid during a tribal “21 gun salute.” Unfortunately, there aren’t a whole lot
- 01:44
of gun safety classes in Nigeria.
- 01:48
Since he didn't mean to whack the kid, he only got 7 years of exile from the village.
- 01:54
Naturally, I started planning the mother of all house parties, but it turns out I had
- 02:00
to go with him into the boonies.
- 02:05
News from the home front wasn't great...apparently the whites took out a bunch of neighboring
- 02:13
villagers that killed a tourist. Or maybe it was a missionary. The villagers didn't
- 02:16
really investigate. Anyway, those pesky evangelists started trickling
- 02:19
into our neighborhood…
- 02:21
… and their peace and love spiel sounded a lot better than my dad’s "slice and dice"
- 02:23
policy. Plus, those missionaries had some really good mojo, because they voluntarily
- 02:23
decided to live in the Evil Forest…
- 02:23
…and they didn't die horrible deaths! I was kind of impressed, but I knew dad would
- 02:23
kill me if I hung out with the Christians. Then he actually did try to kill me, so I
- 02:25
decided to cut my losses and join the missionary school. That oughtta fix his little red wagon!
- 02:26
When Pops got back after his 7 year timeout, he was super-angry to find the white man taking
- 02:31
over his stomping grounds and changing things up in a big way. There was a serious culture
- 02:36
clash...they insulted our gods…
- 02:38
…so we burned their church. That little shenanigan landed Okonkwo in prison for a
- 02:42
while.
- 02:42
The minute he got out of the slammer, Dad was on fire for revenge, and he got pretty
- 02:48
P.O.ed that no one wanted to back him up. So, he killed himself.
- 02:55
The tribe was really upset about it, but they still knuckled under to the missionaries,
- 02:59
and all Okonkwo’s efforts got him was a paragraph in a white guy's book.
- 03:04
Sure, my dad was a jerk, but in the end, he deserved more respect than he died with. So
- 03:08
long, Pops. This yam’s for you.
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