First paragraph of A Squatter's Tale by Ike Oguine
The most memorable event of the tenth year of my life was the arrival of my Uncle Happiness at our house in Yaba, Lagos, Nigeria on a visit from America. It was his first, and to date, only visit to his home country since he had left in January 1970, claiming to the Americans to be on the run from the Nigerian government which he said had placed him on a Wanted List because of his exploits in the Biafran Army during the just-ended Nigerian civil war. He had, in fact, largely spent the war concealed in the toilet of my parents' house in our hometown, his heart pounding to the real and imagined bootfalls of the Biafran Army's conscripting squads. Uncle happiness was a huge, perfectly black, perfectly smooth balloon, topped with a black balloon-shaped, clean-shaven head divided in the middle by the widest smile on earth. He was supported by two boomerang legs that did not walk but gently rolled forward, like wheels. That rain-sodden evening in 1976, the balloon was packed into a dark brown cowboy outfit, straight from Hollywood, which included a ten-gallon hat and spurs. The only thing missing was a holstered pistol.
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Discussion
Immediately apparent about A Squatter's Tale was that each reader experienced the book different levels. Issues such as migration, capitalism and comedy were alternately understood as the central part of the novel. One participant felt that the narrator's evident lack of consideration for the people in his life made the story deeply distressing and had found it difficult to finish the novel. Indeed, Obi does always look for the easy way out and in doing so is frequently dishonest and often uses people, many of them vulnerable.
However, other participants were struck instead by Obi's alienation and cultural
disorientation. This aspect of the novel informed the comic parts of the narrative.
A South African participant, who had studied in the USA felt that the narrator
echoed much of her own experiences of moving from an African country to the
United States. Another participant felt that the issue of morality (in Obi's
relationships for example) were less important than other facets of the narrative.
The issue of immigration and population movement generated much discussion. As one participant commented, in our discussion of Obi's choices in the novel, we had been skirting the very issue of the morality of migration.
This was a rich discussion, opening up many avenues for thought, such as whether Obi comes across as a sympathetic character and whether or not the novel presents a negative image of Nigeria and Nigerians. The unrelenting male-centred viewpoint was also discussed, as was the ending. The group as a whole was undecided as to whether it was redemptive or hopeful.
Reviews by members of the Reading Group
"Perhaps only a Nigerian could write such a devastating account of Nigerian amorality, disloyalty and exploitation of their own. In Obi, Ike Oguine has created a character without virtue; ambitious only to find the easy route to an easy life. His views on Nigeria itself are equally uncompromising.
On one level this is an amusing, detailed and often eloquent tale of a certain recognisable type of young man, first riding a wave of corrupt success at home, then feeling the force of cultural alienation as an illegal immigrant to the USA; a comedy of manners, of homesickness, and universal truths about human nature.
On another level it is
unremittingly bleak; revealing a world peopled by the self-interested and
the self-deceived, where characters are trapped and unhappy victims of their
own natures, always ready to spread the
unhappiness a little wider in their own self-interest."
"Oguine's skills with the English language and keen sense of observation, created a very witty novel whose dark humour often transcends the realities of his life. His characters, such as the tragic-comic Uncle Happiness are well-drawn and come to life off the page. Also, the alienation that each character experiences, whatever their motives for moving to America or their methods of creating a better life, is deeply felt, and well written.
His treatment of his girlfriends and habitual use of people for his own purposes can often be eye-openingly blasé, but much of his attitude to people and his success, I feel, stem from modern capitalist paradigms of success. While much of the comedy is generated by the observation of the cultural differences Obi experiences, the similarities in the accumulation of wealth in a new capitalist society (Nigeria) and in a more established economy, (the United States), were often very close. By setting half of his novel in Nigeria and the other half in the USA, there was a tacit comparison between the two apparently opposite countries. This made for a very interesting novel."