Some passages I thought were particularly moving...
--God said, "You can either have these cattle, as my gift to you, or you can have the What." My father waited for the necessary response.
--But...Sadiq said, helping out, --What is the What? he said, with an air of theatrical inquisitiveness.
--Yes, yes. That was the question. So the first man lifted his head to God and asked what this was, this What. "What is the What?" the first man asked. And God said to the man, "I cannot tell you. Still, you have to choose. You have to choose between the cattle and the What." Well then. The man and the woman could see the cattle right there in front of them, and they knew that with cattle, they would eat and live with great contentment. They could see the cattle were God's most perfect creation, and that the cattle carried something godlike within themselves. (This might upset some of you environmentalists...I guess there is a deeply entrenched adoration and respect for the bovine) They knew that they would live in peace with the cattle, and that if they helped the cattle eat and drink , the cattle would give man their milk, would multiply every year and keep the monyjang happy and healthy. So the first man and woman knew they would be fools to pass up the cattle for this idea of the What. So the man chose cattle. And God has proven that this was the correct decision. God was testing the man. He was testing the man, to see if he could appreciate what he had been given, if he could take pleasure in the bounty before him, rather than trade it for the unknown.
page 62
...you have to wonder then if the grass is actually greener on the other side. I suppose it's pretty safe to assume it's not or that is might be, but you aren't willing to peek over to check. I suppose this is all this is: safe. I guess one has to take the leap and give up the comfort of the known to explore the uncertainty of the unknown. I wonder what the Ghost would say about this?...
Sometimes the teeth can accidentally bite the tongue, but the solution for the tongue is not to find another mouth to live in.
page 176
'Light of my heart, do not let my darkness speak to me.'
page 358-9
Seeing this part of Kenya made it all the more depressing and inconceivable that our refugee camp had been placed where it had. We pressed our faces to the glass and wondered, Why couldn't they put Kakuma there? Or there, or there? Do not think it was lost on us that the Kenyans, and every international body that monitors or provides for the displaced, customarily place their refugees in the least desirable regions on earth. There we become utterly dependent -- unable to grow our own food, to tend our own livestock, to live in any sustainable way. I do not judge the UNHCR or any nation that takes in the nationless, but I do pose the question.
page 454
Here was one I just could not agree with though. This only because I too have sat, impatient, in pain, waiting as person after person moves through an emergency room ahead of me. I've been a victim of crimes against my property and the authorities took all day to respond and then filed, "a complaint". Yeah, I'd like to file a complaint against the police department. And I'm pretty sure, though, that I have worth...I'm not invisible, as Achuk claims to be. Still, sh*t happens and sometimes we are powerless.
I gave the police officer this number and now I know that they did not try to call it even once. The phone is still in possession of the people who stole it, those who robbed and beat me, and this phone is still working. The police did not bother to investigate the crime, and the criminals knew the police would do nothing. This is the moment, above any other, when I wonder if I actually exist. If one of the parties involved, the police or the criminals, believed that I had worth or a voice, then this phone would have been disposed of. But it seems clear that there has been no acknowledgment of my existence on either side of this crime.
page 471
You having a good day?
You having a good day?
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