The Famished Road

Madame Koto continues to change; her jewelry is more elaborate, and her figure grows fuller. The season is hot, and “[t]ime moved slower than the hot air” (270). When he is not at the bar, Azaro sits outside the house watching men chase a boy down the street. Azaro notices, suddenly one day, that “the Photographer’s glass cabinet was gone” (271). Someone sets fire to the van again.

Azaro decides to go to the bar and discovers it is full of men and women drinking and dancing sensually to music from the new gramophone. They tease Azaro about his sexual intentions. Madame Koto gives him some palm wine, and a “midget woman” (274) proposes marriage to him. He tries to leave the bar, overwhelmed by the rowdiness, but Madame Koto drags him back in. A bird lands on the gramophone, and Madame Koto catches and frees it. This incites wonder in the crowd, as the men carefully carry off the gramophone while the “women stayed behind” (276).

Azaro takes this opportunity to leave the bar, wandering the streets “not sure of where to go” (277). He happens upon a group of men working, one of whom is white; they are “connecting electricity” (277).