rachordu

I have read the entire book and my Parents' Bedroom is particularly shocking (all the stories are shocking even for me who was born and raised in Nigeria). I know the book is fiction but I still want to ask: did people really kill their spouses in Rwanda during the period of the genocide? if they did, it must have been really horrific and my heart goes out to anyone out there who has experienced such tragedy, especially those who were children at that time. It is difficult to comprehend how healing can ever come for such people but I can only urge them to try, try, in the midst of the pain, the tears, to forgive.

globalgram

What sits on my heart after reading all of these stories is that this is our family, our human family (all of us), that is caught up in a Gordian knot of fear and hate and dehumanizing violence. This is us. You and me. We ARE one of them. These stories of Africa are brutal and stark, fierce and relentless in their truth telling, but they point to the need to ask ourselves the deepest questions possible, to dig and dig and dig to understand how this kind of darkness works its way into our own hearts, our relationships, our politics, our religious beliefs, into our actions, how it is playing in our own society. These days, we all seem so eager abandon dignity and mutual respect for our own intensely negative, preciously held, easily spouted, highly charged (often narrow) opinions that pose an enemy outside. If that continues, what is happening in Africa, in the middle-east, what happened in Nazi Germany, Cambodia, and East Timor is not so far away.

Though it was difficult for me to face picking up Say You're One of Them again after finishing "Fattening for Gabon", I now find myself needing to re-read all the stories. Because the first time through, I was racing through each story to get to the end of the devastation I was experiencing in the reading. Now I want to read to find the deeper questions that each story poses, the deeper, subtler layers of revelation each story offers.

producerji

Oct 23, 2009 4:40 PM

  |   in response to: globalgram

I, too, raced through each story hoping for the happy ending I knew was not going to come. But once I stopped to reflect, I found that each story offered a ray of hope in its own unique and yes, subtle way. Thanks for reading -- and re-reading! I hope you join us for our webcast discussion on Monday, November 9th!

saraphina

Oct 24, 2009 10:14 PM

  |   in response to: producerji

This is indeed the best book I¿ve ever read in my life. This is the first time I¿ve been part of Oprah¿s Book Club and I¿m so glad that I did! When I first started reading an Ex-Mas Feast I shuffled around the book looking to see whether I was reading fact or fiction. When I found out that it was fiction I breathed a sigh of relief. Then as I continued reading the story I realized that the characters were the only fiction in this book.
After going through the first four stories, My Parents Bedroom was very difficult to read. I was so stressed reading this story¿..I experienced all the emotions and confusion the little girl lived. I kept asking myself what is going on here. What¿s this leading up to¿.and then as the story unfolded I understood, having heard about the Rwanda massacres.
I thought back to when I my son was nine¿..I would not consider even using a bad word around him. I protected him from so many ¿bad¿ things¿. then I thought about what these children in Rwanda experienced. Can you imagine being nine or any age, living a ¿normal¿ life and in a split second things change to the extent of what was experienced in ¿My Parents Bedroom

jenkeating

An amazing book and extremely well written. I am South African but living in the UK now. Although it never fails to break my heart, I'm afraid that there are elements in this book that are an EVERYDAY event in various parts of Africa; and worse, if you can imagine it.

joyceanne5

There are many things in this story that break your heart as you empathize with the characters. Where to begin? The struggle of the parents as they try to find a way to process their disgust and shame of what Maisha does each night, and their absolute need for the money Maisha brings the family.

It tore me apart to read of how the mother gave the children glue to sniff in order to kill their hunger. As a mother and grandmother myself, this seems utterly impossible to me. No wonder the children often are glaze-eyed and slow to respond. Think of the brain cells that are being destroyed. Very hard to think of this.

When the kids bring the baby out onto the streets with them so their begging will yield more money, it shocked to see how the children were treated as a commodity for the parents. One does not doubt the parents love for their children, but the horrid circumstances dictate using the kids.

This story certainly shocked me. I wanted to hold those kids close and comfort them, to feed them warm and nutrisous food. Heartbreaking story.

adv57865

I picked up Say Your One of Them out of curiosity as I wanted to compare the stories to my own experience while I lived in Port Harcourt, Nigeria for 2 years.
The truthfulness tugged at my heart, I felt compassion and sadness.There was a subtle progression in the stories of upsetting and sickening events with the most horrible being told at the end.
I am grateful that Uwem Akpan has written the book. My conscience and feelings have been stirred at this call for help. What is becoming of us?
The dark continent of Africa is becoming darker and the mirrored images reflected are not pretty.
Anger, hate, greed, jealousy; all fear focus on division and separation in families, countries and cultures. Hope, joy, freedom,peace, - love; unite and strengthen. It seems to me that it is time to reconsider our beliefs, values, ideals and develop a new set of terms to live by in order to walk forward. Because we are one of Them.

rachordu

Oct 26, 2009 3:05 PM

  |   in response to: adv57865

I would not use the expression "dark" to describe the African continent. Admittedly, Africa has its problems--hunger, poverty, bad leadership, you can name it but dark is not one of them. And if indeed we are "Dark" the West is complicit in our darkness, they have for decades preferred it so. It began with colonialism and it has continued with Shell, Chevron, Nestle, etc, and the continued abuses of human rights in many developing countries perpetrated by multinationals. Much of our resources get repatriated to the West in the name of foreign investment. The WTO tells us how and what to trade. There is so much money being raised to help Africa in the name of aid but where is all the money? Where is it going? They all together seems like a drop in the ocean. Maisha and her family in "An Es mass Feast" believed having a white client was a big deal. It shows how much people from the West come to take advantage of us, our situation. So we are not a dark continent, we are victims of decades of manipulation, oppression and bad leadership. As a people we also have some very positive cultures and values which unfortunately you will not read about because those who portray us to the world decide how we should be portrayed not us.

carolkenny

Oct 26, 2009 7:48 PM

  |   in response to: producerji

Despite the horrible events ending this story, with the mother brutally murdered by her husband in front of her children, and the victims hidden over the ceiling about to be burned to death by their own people, Monique, like all of the children in these stories, showed the only positive glimmer of hope. As I did in other stories, I let my mind travel forward at the end of the story. In my vision, Monique will save her brother, and they will escape from the horrors of their childhood. You mentioned problems in your own childhood, and yet you now seem to be living a rich, full life. I must focus on the ability of people like you, Oprah, Tyler Perry, Tererai and the children in these stories (except Jubril, who is dead)to break the cycle of terror. I re-read each story repeatedly to learn from it and shift my focus to positive actions we can take as a civilization to "move forward," becoming a world where these awful things are never done to anyone, anywhere in the world.

livehappy4

Hello everyone! I still have not read these stories yet, but your comments and reviews really leave me salivating to read them. This sounds horribly sad and tumultuous - as I write this, it makes me sound like a bad person to want to read something so horrid - but as I read your reviews, it's obvious that the stories bring lessons of strength and salvation to the characters as well.

I can only hope that every reader of this book will carry what they know throughout life and help to live in kinder, more accepting ways.

Thanks for letting me lurk on the board! I barely have time to read my own book club selections when I'm writing. These posts really help me narrow down the books I definitely don't want to miss.

Peace ladies,

Melissa

trhjamaica

What was I doing when the Rwanda Genocide occurred? I was busy with 4-month-old twin boys. I was in the middle of a marriage where occasional domestic violence occurred due to my then-husband¿s madness and meanness. So, the impact of what happened in Rwanda seemed somewhat surreal and I was just glad I wasn¿t there¿glad my friends weren¿t there¿glad my family wasn¿t there¿HORRIFIED that anyone had to live through that. I put my thoughts on the shelf and continued on with the business of caring for my little boys¿and trying to survive my own mess of a marriage.

Well, reading this story made the Rwanda Genocide a lot less surreal and forced me to experience it in live and in living color.

Jill¿I like your hope for Monique. And I think you¿re so on-point with that. Earlier in the summer, I had stumbled across the music of Corneille who is from Rwanda. I noticed that the Oprah website featured comments from him and I HIGHLY RECOMMEND his CD. He is definitely the personification of "walking forward"¿which is all anyone can do after surviving any horrific experience. Walking forward is certainly what I did by getting a divorce from my marriage madness when my twins were 2-years-old.

I know I'll carry this phrase with me from now on...just as I'll carry this haunting story.

jobitek

"My Parent's Bedroom" like "Fattening for Gabon" or "Luxurious Hearses" left me looking through my fingers on the last page, afraid to go through to the last sentence. It was the story that Akpan, I believe, treated with most gentility. For all his efforts, my heart still broke, but then I was prepared for that after having seen a movie called "It Always Rains in April," an account of the days leading up to the genocide in Rwanda in the lives of a family very much like Akpan's. As an African from Uganda who was aware of the impending violence even before it was news, I feel that Akpan's presentation of "My Parent's Bedroom" the last vestige of privacy in any home, should reveal the porousness and irony of this idea. We are all involved. We are all culpable. And we are all responsible. I am grateful for Akpan's reminder that these children's voices are our children's voices, and if we think they're not then why listen to their stories, why feel their pain?

swanyce

"My Parents' Bedroom" is absolutely the most powerful and horrifying realization of racism, how far human beings can go against other human beings. The genuine, candid, yet shaking to the bone words of Monique remind me of Immaculee Illibagiza in her "Let To Tell" account of surviving the Rwandan genocide.

As Jobitek mentioned earlier, I am sure Akpan tried to be as gentle as possible when telling this story. Yet, such extreme acts of violence leave a mark in our souls and should teach us to never, ever, go back there again in history. "Say You're One Of Them" is the true reminder that this is a reality, that this is happening, and that we should be aware of it. Yes, these children voices are our children's voices because we are, in a way or the other, all connected. We are one of them.

I can't wait for the webcast on Monday.