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Similes
Chapter 3
Explanation and Analysis—Church of Thieves:
Ifemelu’s strained relationship with religion is punctuated with moment of situational irony in Chapter 3. While helping at her mother’s new church one Sunday, Ifemelu points out the moral failings of the churchgoers and gets chided by Sister Ibinabo in kind:
“Chief Omenka is a 419 and everybody knows it,” she said. “This church is full of 419 men. Why should we pretend that this hall was not built with dirty money?”
“It is God’s work,” Sister Ibinabo said quietly. “If you cannot do God’s work then you should go. Go."
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Chapter 6
Explanation and Analysis—Mistress Uju:
Apart from her easy glamor and playful comfort, Aunty Uju becomes a source of situational irony in Chapter 6. When her father’s slumping finances bring the family to desperate straits, Ifemelu approaches her aunt asking for extra money. More shocking than aunt’s denial of the request is her casual admission that she actually has no money:
Unlock with LitCharts A+“Oga never gives me big money. He pays all the bills and he wants me to ask for everything I need. Some men are like that.”
Ifemelu stared. Aunty Uju, in her big pink house with the wide satellite dish blooming from its roof, her generator brimming with diesel, her freezer stocked with meat, and she did not have money in her bank account.
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Chapter 28
Explanation and Analysis—Birthday Surprise:
Obinze’s moment of overwhelming fear in Chapter 28 becomes a source of situational irony. As news of asylum seekers and immigrant arrests crowd the headlines, he braces himself for his own deportation. The morning he notices his colleagues “[avoid] his eyes” with an “unnatural stiffness in their movements, he suspects himself to be all but caught:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Then he sensed a movement behind him, quick and violent and too close, and before he could turn around, a paper hat had been pushed onto his head. It was Nigel, and with him a gathering of grinning men.
“Happy birthday, Vinny Boy!” they all said.
Obinze froze, frightened by the complete blankness of his mind. Then he realized what it was. Vincent’s birthday. Roy must have told the men. Even he had not remembered to remember Vincent’s date of birth.
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Chapter 29
Explanation and Analysis—Emenike’s Success:
Obinze’s meal with Emenike in Chapter 29 comes wrapped with situational irony. By the time Emenike meets him at the restaurant, Obinze finds a smooth-spoken man scarcely recognizable from the classmate from his memories:
Unlock with LitCharts A+“Oh, I think he’ll like it,” Emenike said. Self-satisfaction, that was the difference in him. He was married to a British woman, lived in a British home, worked at a British job, traveled on a British passport, said “exercise” to refer to a mental rather than a physical activity. He had longed for this life, and never quite believed he would have it. Now his backbone was stiff with self-satisfaction. He was sated. In the restaurant in Kensington, a candle glowed on the table, and the blond waiter, who seemed too tall and handsome to be a waiter, served tiny bowls of what looked like green jelly.
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Chapter 52
Explanation and Analysis—Weightless Desire:
Ifemelu’s reunion with her former lover reignites passionate feelings—meeting Obinze in Nigeria and falling in love again plunges her into “heady days full of cliche.” In a moment of situational irony in Chapter 52, she burns with desire and pleads with him to have sex:
Unlock with LitCharts A+“We’re not single people who are courting, Ceiling,” she said. “We can’t deny the attraction between us and maybe we should have a conversation about that.”
“You know this isn’t about sex,” he said. “This has never been about sex.” “I know,” she said, and took his hand. There was, between them, a weightless, seamless desire.
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