Hitting Budapest

Plot

Hitting Budapest is a story written by NoViolet Bulawayo. It recounts the activities of six juvenile delinquents: Basta, Chipo, Godknows, Sbho, Stina and the narrator, whose name is not given. They are on a routine guava stealing escapade in a rich neighbouring estate, Budapest.

Though they are forbidden to cross Mzilikazi Road, on this day, they cross it in order to enter Budapest. Besides, despite having better responsibilities at home, they abandon them and have to go to Budapest. For example, Basta is supposed to babysit his sister, Fraction, but is not bothered. He must go to Budapest. They take advantage of their parents' irresponsibility to easily file past them and go to Budapest. Their mothers are busy with their hairs and talk while their fathers are too busy with draughts to even notice them pass.

Chipo is pregnant and her grandfather, who has already been arrested and detained, is responsible for it. So she can't run as fast as she would before she was pregnant. In fact, they have to stop every now and then in order for her to take a rest. 

Budapest is conspicuously a contrast of Paradise, where the children live: "Budapest is like a different country. A country where people who are not like us live" (p.98). According to the child narrator, the place looks deserted and lacks  the many of bad things found in Paradise. Particularly, the air in Budapest has no smells such as those of burning things, cooking food or rotting things. Apart from these, the houses here are big, have gravelled yards, tall fences and a sense of aesthetics around them. In addition, people don't even have interest in eating fruit. 

The children intend to gather all the guavas in Budapest. To achieve this, they have to pick a street and clear all the fruit from it's trees before moving to the next street. They are stopped by a voice just after passing SADC Street, a street whose guavas they cleared two weeks ago. They do not run because the voice does not sound dangerous. A thin woman appears. She's eating something they have never seen before and they wish she would shared it with them. She later throws the thing she's eating but the children wish she had just given it to them. They have never seen anyone throw away food in their lifetime. This is a sign of abject poverty back where the live.

This strange woman inquires about the ages of the juveniles. The outspoken Godknows tells her that She and the narrator are nine, Basta is eleven, Sbho is eight but Stina's age is unknown to them. The strange woman introduces herself as Mello. She's 33 and is visiting her father's country for the first time from London. 

The children then walk away from the woman after she has taken pictures of them. They go to IMF Street and pick on a home with a big house and a swimming pool. The guavas here are too sweet to explain. Once they have plucked enough of them, they comfortably walk on the streets of Budapest eating and spitting the peels without worrying about dirtying the environment. In fact, Basta hits one of the houses with a guava, staining it  pink. This does not even bother him. 

They get back to Paradise when they have finished eating all their guavas. They then see a truck and before they can run away, they are ordered to get inside the truck. The kids do not know where they are being taken to but, eventually, they learn that they are at a juvenile correction centre. Here, Chipo gives birth and all of them are taught how to read and write and their dreams are rekindled. 

Charactersand characterization 

The narrator

The narrator is a nine-year old girl whose dream is to go to America to live with her aunt, Fostalina, and improve her life. She's, therefore, ambitious. She's also wise since young as she is, she knows that dreaming of going to America is a better dream than that of graduating from stealing guavas to stealing bigger things in people's houses. 

She's naive, though this is expected, considering her age, the fact that she's not schooled and lives in the ghetto. She uses a language that implies that she does not know much. For example, she refers to Chipo's pregnancy as a stomach with something that keeps growing inside. She does not even know what Mello eats and chooses to refer to it as a thing. This innocent language,as will be discussed later, helps create humour throughout the story.

Chipo

She is a girl aged ten and is already pregnant for her own grandfather. She was the best runner in the whole of Paradise until her grandfather made her pregnant. She's also naive since she doesn't even know what happens to a pregnant person. She doesn't know what to say when she's asked whether she wants a boy or a girl. She does not even know why men who put babies in women's stomachs do not come to take the babies outside: "I don't know. I don't want a baby. I don't want anything, just guavas..." (P. 98). Her naivety is also exuded when she asks Mello what that is she is eating. 

She's also keen/observant. She observes that there's no way Basta will go outside the country and get money to build a house without having gone to school. She also proves to be pessimistic when she tells the narrator that America is far and her plane may crash while she's inside or they may even be attacked by terrorists. 

Sbho

She's a girl of eight but is the prettiest in the whole of Paradise even with her missing teeth. Her ambition is to marry a man from Budapest who will take her away from Paradise and all its problems. She's, therefore, also as ambitious as the rest of the children. 

Stina

She's a taciturn boy whose age is not known. He rarely speaks, but when he does, then whatever he has to say it very important. For instance, if they had listened to him when he tells them to run away from the approaching truck, they would have escaped the arrest. They, however, choose not to run and are arrested. In fact, they call him a coward for advising them to run. 

Basta

He's a bullish boy of eleven. He's a self-imposed leader of this gang of juveniles. His bullish nature is evident from the very beginning of the story when he wallops the big-headed naked boy. This is followed by the narrator's reminder that Basta had told them not to play with Chipo just because she's pregnant. The narrator also implies that Basta would gang up with Chipo on her, may be beat her up. Also, when Stina tells them to run, he bullishly calls him a coward. It is also worth noting that earlier, he had imposed on them the desire to start stealing bigger things inside people's houses. 

Lastly, when they are arrested, he shuts up the narrator when she says she believes they are being taken to America and wants to forcibly make her believe they are being taken to South Africa. 

Godknows

Godknows is a talkative boy aged nine like the narrator. He's the one that makes the ages of the five of them known. He's also the one that inquires about Mello's age and name. His outspoken nature helps bring out the theme of emigration and underlines how these emigrants later neglect their duties to their parents and families. 

Godknows' observant nature makes him able to decipher the fact that Mello is 33 but looks like she's 15. 

Mello

She's a woman aged thirty three. She's visiting her father's country for the first time. She's sophisticated since she has a camera that's never been seen before by the children. Besides, she's eating a type of food that's not known in these parts of the country. 

She asks the children to say "cheese", something that sophisticated people say when taking photos in order to appear to be smiling. 

Chipo's grandfather 

He's an inconsiderate old man who impregnates his granddaughter without caring about the troubles she will go through with the pregnancy. 

Uncle Polite

He is Godknows' uncle.He is a selfish man who forgets about his family as soon as he arrives in London. 

Aunt Fostalina 

She's the narrator's aunt who lives in America. She embodies the narrators dreams and aspirations. 

Styles 

Flashback

The narrator flashbacks the story mother of bones had told them earlier. The relevance of this flashback is to warn people against doing things whose meaning they don't understand. Godknows also flashbacks when uncle Polite had sent them sweets from London before he completely forgot about them. The role of this flashback is to highlight the theme of emigration.

Contrast/juxtaposition 

Paradise and Budapest are juxtaposed and there is a poignant contrast between them. The description of the two places paints Paradise as a poor neighbourhood while Budapest as a rich one. In Paradise, people do not throw food, but this happens in Budapest, specifically, when Mello throws away her 'thing'. 

How the children withstand the heat and hard earth is contrasted with Mello's inability to do that. Apart from this, the image the children have of a real gate is contrasted to that of the gate in Budapest. Specifically, the gate in Paradise is supposed to make a lot of noise when hit with a guava but that in Budapest does not make this kind of noise. 

This juxtaposition helps bring out the attitudes of both the rich and poor towards life.

Humour 

The innocent tone the writer adopts helps bring out a lot of humour. For example, the narrator says that from the thinness of the woman, it is clear that they are not going to run. It is also humorous that instead of Chipo listening to Mello, she's busy looking at the food Mello throws on the ground. 

The narrator's narration of mother of Bone's story is also humorous. 

How innocently, the narrator talks about the "cheese" part is humorous. She also humorously, through implying, explains what transpires when one eats guavas without breaking the seeds into pieces. Later, he compares the excruciating resultant pain to that experienced during giving birth.

Style of narration 

NoViolet Bulawayo deliberately chooses a child narrator in order to ridicule major issues in African countries. The the naive child narrator innocently and humorously talks about grave issues that would have otherwise needed a serious tone to talk about. Among the issues are defilement, emigration, childhood dreams and ambitions that often go to waste, traditions and negligence of parental responsibilities among many other issue.  It would have been very difficult to address these issues using a serious tone.

Symbolism 

Paradise symbolises the hope that poor people have in life. They always hope that their tomorrows will be better than their pasts. The six children from Paradise all have ambitions and dreams. Some, like Sbho, desire to marry rich husbands, others desire to go abroad and others to have education and more money.

Budapest, on the other hand, being a name of a city in Hungary, symbolizes the desires of Africans to live abroad. It also symbolizes Africans that want to live like the people abroad. 

Point of view 

The story is told from the first person point of view. This vintage point makes it possible for the narrator to report issues firsthand. 

Themes 

Defilement 

Chipo's grandfather impregnates her when she's still so Young, she's only ten.

Ambitions and dreams 

The children have different ambitions and dreams. The narrator has dreams to go to America. Sbho dreams of marrying a rich man while Basta wants to stop stealing guavas and start stealing bigger things in houses. 

These dreams represent the dreams of most, if not all, African children. The dreams are most of the times as simple as these ones appear and are based on their surroundings. What they think is the best may not necessarily be the best by the standards of other parts of the world.

Emigration 

The story brings to the fore African dreams of leaving their countries for other countries abroad. Uncle Polite is in London while aunt Fostalina is in America. The narrator also dreams to join her aunt in America. 

This theme is also emphasized in the children's dreams to leave the country.

Poverty

The children come from poor backgrounds. They barely have enough to eat  that's why they have never seen anyone throw away. Their dressing also depicts poverty: "Basta wears a black tracksuit bottom that he never takes off, and a faded orange T-shirt..." (P. 103), "...I look at Godknows' shorts , torn at the back, at his pitch-black back peeping like strange eyes through the dirty white fabric."

Negligence of parental roles 

The children's parents have neglected their parental responsibilities. Their mothers are busy making their hairs and gossiping while their fathers are always busy playing draught. They don't even bother to take  the children to school. In fact, the children only have faint memories of school: "When we were going to school..." (P.103). The children take advantage of this negligence to leave home and go to steal guavas in Budapest. Eventually, the government has to intervene and take the children to a juvenile correction centre in order to give them education and other life skills.