Half of a Yellow Sun: Part 1, Chapter 2 Summary & Analysis

The narrative now follows Olanna, who is driving with Odenigbo to the airport and listening to High Life music. She is about to fly to her parents’ home in Lagos. Odenigbo drops her off and Olanna thinks about how exciting their relationship still is. At the airport Olanna talks to a rural family waiting for their brother to return. He was the first family member to go overseas. The plane lands and the family’s grandmother panics, thinking that the plane won’t stop, but Olanna holds her hand and comforts her.

Olanna then has to get on her own flight, and the man sitting next her compliments her beauty. Olanna knows that the confident Odenigbo laughs at her many admirers, and decides to tell Odenigbo about this man on the plane. She remembers how she first met Odenigbo. She had been in a serious relationship with a man named Mohammed at the time, and one day she was waiting in line for the theater. The ticket seller let a white man go ahead of her, and Odenigbo called him out for this loudly. Olanna was immediately attracted to him and said “well done,” and Odenigbo introduced himself. Since then she and Odenigbo had been together, but only for brief visits at a time. She is nervous about moving in with him.

That night Olanna has to have dinner with her parents and Chief Okonji, the finance minister. Her twin sister Kainene is there too. They have a fancy meal and the family laughs at all of Chief Okonji’s jokes, as Olanna’s father is trying to get a building contract from him. Chief Okonji offers Olanna a job in his department, but she tells him that she is moving to Nsukka soon. He then turns to Kainene, who says that she will be managing the family business in Port Harcourt. Olanna looks at her sister and wishes that they were still close.

Chief Okonji invites the family to his house for the weekend, and Olanna realizes that he has been promised an affair with her in exchange for the building contract. She coldly declines, and her parents look disappointed. After dinner Olanna goes onto the balcony and Chief Okonji confronts her. He drunkenly tries to seduce her but she pushes him away and leaves.

Later that night Olanna’s mother comes to her room and praises Chief Okonji’s expensive lace. She finally asks about Odenigbo, and questions Olanna’s decision to move to Nsukka. Her mother is clearly disappointed, but Olanna is firm. She feels that she is always disappointing her mother with her rebellious ideals and her refusal to marry rich businessmen.

Kainene then comes to Olanna’s room and sarcastically discusses Olanna being used as “sex bait.” Kainene says that her boyfriend Richard is moving to Nsukka as well, and she asks Olanna to introduce him to her “revolutionary lover.” Olanna has never liked Kainene’s English boyfriends, but she likes Richard because he is shy and not condescending to Africans. Olanna tries to make small talk but Kainene leaves. Olanna thinks about how they used to be close friends. Lately they have drifted apart, and Kainene always rejects Olanna’s offerings of friendship.

Olanna takes a train to Kano, a town in the North, to visit her Uncle Mbaezi and Aunty Ifeka. They are poor but very welcoming, and Olanna prefers their company to her own parents. She joyfully greets her cousin Arize, and as she enters the house she feels that no matter what else might happen in her life, everything will always be in the proper order here in Kano.

Olanna’s family’s friend Abdulmalik, a Hausa man who makes slippers, gives Olanna some slippers and invites her to his house on her next visit. Arize gossips with Olanna, saying that she wants to marry a man named Nnakwanze and have children. She laments that Olanna’s old boyfriend Mohammed was a Hausa, because he was so good looking.

That night Olanna lies awake thinking – the family here in Kano all lives in one room, so the children must have heard their parents making love. She contrasts this with her own parents, who now have separate bedrooms and a house with ten rooms. Olanna thinks that her parents’ life seems artificial and shameful compared to life in this village.

The next day Olanna goes to visit Mohammed, her ex-boyfriend. Mohammed’s family is very wealthy, and Olanna first passes by a guard at the gates of their home. She and Mohammed are still friends, and they banter with each other. Mohammed implies that he is still in love with Olanna, but he teases her about Odenigbo. She remembers how she broke up with him immediately after she met Odenigbo.

Olanna asks Mohammed to take her for a drive around the city, and he jokingly says she is like the white people who “gawk at everyday things.” Olanna greets Mohammed’s mother, who is friendly to her now that she isn’t dating her son and threatening to taint his lineage “with infidel blood.” They get in Mohammed’s car and Olanna declares that she is not like white people. Mohammed reassures her that she is a “nationalist and a patriot,” about to marry a “freedom fighter.”

When Olanna finally moves to Nsukka, Odenigbo has to leave the next day to attend a conference about the black American mathematician David Blackwell. Olanna gets her own apartment but she plans to stay at Odenigbo’s house most of the time. Olanna decides to stay at the house and adjust while Odenigbo is away. She changes some things that disturb Ugwu, like switching the fake flowers at the table for real ones from the yard. She notices that Ugwu has the habit of saving everything, even things he could have no possible use for. She wonders what he thinks of her.

When Odenigbo returns Olanna feels suddenly joyous, and like the house is really hers now. They immediately have sex, and afterward Odenigbo’s usual visitors arrive. He introduces Olanna to Miss Adebayo, who calls her “illogically pretty,” and to Okeoma, and who calls her a “water mermaid.” After dinner they argue about philosophy and the genocides of history, and Olanna feels like an outsider.

Weeks pass and Olanna starts to settle in. Odenigbo teases her that Okeoma and Dr. Patel are both falling in love with her, and Okeoma starts reciting poems about goddesses that look like her. Miss Adebayo, however, seems to think Olanna is unintellectual, too pretty, and “mimicking-the-oppressor” with her English accent. Olanna tries to contribute to their discussions and impress her, but finally she recognizes that Miss Adebayo will never like her no matter what. Olanna remains strongly in love with Odenigbo, but she rejects his offers of marriage, as she wants to preserve their exciting relationship.