To page 178

Wow...

We first find out that a road is being built to the village (Olinka). When I was reading this, I had the feeling that something bad was going to come out of this. But not knowing any better, the Olinkas welcomed the road builders and even had a huge celebration with them. It turns out that the road was scheduled to go right through their village. Huts, crops, the school, and the church were all destroyed. The Olinkas felt very betrayed. I felt so bad for them because they didn't know that it would have such a bad effect on them. We also find out that Tashi's father dies from Malaria. It is so sad to see someone lose their dad. It sounded like he got proper funeral rights and that he will be honored forever. Tashi's mom is now open to the idea of her daughter getting an education. Other girls in the village are also attending school. This does not go over well with the men, but who cares about them. Men and women should get equal rights. This quote really angered me: "The men do not like it: who wants a wife who knows everything her husband knows?" (page 172). It is a women's right to know just as much!

I also found it interesting that Corrine was suspicious of Samuel and Nettie. She specifically told Nettie that she cannot have Samuel over without her. Corrine then gets out a bible and makes Nettie swear that she never met Samuel prior to the trip. I feel that she wrongly accused Nettie and jumped to conclusions way too fast. She did then apologize, but I think she was wrong for what she did. This made Nettie really unselfconscious. She was worried what Corrine thought of her. She didn't want Corrine to worry about that.

Then came the story from Samuel. I got really lost during this whole thing. So he says that a man's shop and blacksmith shop were burnt to the ground because white men were jealous of his business. The man and his brothers were hanged and beaten. I got really confused as to which person had which children and which one was Celie (if she was even in the story at all). Somehow, Nettie finds out that Pa isn't their father.

I find Celie's last entry very interesting. I think that it really shows her emotions, and I am not sure what she is going to do about all of these stresses.

One other thing I noticed was how Nettie wrote with such proper English. She was able to write a lot and her letters were much easier to read than Celie's. You can really tell that she has had an education.

Somehow, I believe that Celie and Nettie are going to meet up and figure this whole thing out. I think that they have a lot of investigating to do!

--Leah