Situation 1: A school campus, struggling to function under the terrorism of the numerous cults it provides a home too. Nnamabia is, in a word, indifferent. He scoffs at the police's efforts to contain the violence, even seeing humor in the situation. Skipping forward in time, we as the reader are told about an incident in which four cult members stole a teachers car at gun point, killed three students, and drove off. Nnamabia's response is to go out drinking.
Situation 2: Nnamabia is now in prison, where he witnesses an old man - jailed for a crime his son committed - mercilessly bullied by the guards and forced to parade naked in the hall in exchange for water to clean himself. When Nnamabia's family comes to visit, they find their son in an emotional state that was completely unfamiliar to him. He's virtually silent, and refuses to eat the meal they have prepared for him, insisting that some of it is saved for the old man. His entire persona has flipped, or perhaps it's just been shattered.
So question that we have to ask is why? Why does the oppression of the innocent suddenly affects him at such a deep emotional level? Why is only now sinking in? Personally, I attribute this shift to the power of the aftermath. In the first situation, Nnamabia's exposure to the cult violence was primarily through second hand stories and quick glimpses of bodies before they're taken away. But in prison, he is subjected to the entire process. That is the process of breaking a person, both physically and mentally. When he sees the old man reduced to nothing more than twisted entertainment for the guards, all in the hopes of getting something as simple as soap, the reality of the situation finally is finally realized. It shakes the very foundation of his world view, so much so that he is barely recognizable to those who only knew his former self. For better or worse, prison changed him.
This is very interesting Seth. I never thought about it this way, but it makes a lot of sense. Nnamabia was never exposed to the harsh reality of the consequences of all of the cult violence. Once Nnamabia was arrested and went to jail, he finally got to experience everything firsthand. I think experiencing what he did with the old man helped him gain a better understanding of everything and therefore changed him to become a better person.
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ReplyDeleteI was thinking this exact same thing while I was reading the story. It's a hard question to find an answer to, but I agree with your opinion. I think Nnamabia's experience with the old man in prison was so up close and personal that it would have been difficult for it to not affect him differently. He was used to seeing people being killed in an instant, not someone being slowly broken down by daily abuse. I think this more emotional experience was the reason for Nnamabia's 180 degree change in character.
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