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Carole Williams
Bummi is Carole’s mother and Augustine’s wife. Bummi was born in the Niger Delta, Nigeria, in a town destroyed by foreign oil companies. Her early life is marked by significant tragedy and hardship. Both her parents (Moses and Iyatunde) die when she is still young, and she lives in extreme poverty in Lagos until moving in with a harsh, distant cousin, Aunty Ekio, who makes her work as her house-servant. Bummi is studying math at university when she meets and falls deeply in love with Augustine Williams. They marry and, facing a lack of job opportunities in Nigeria, move to London. However, English society finds their Nigerian academic backgrounds invalid, and this forces them to take underpaid work in the service sector. Bummi is devastated when Augustine dies, leaving her to parent Carole alone. Augustine’s death motivates Bummi to start her own cleaning company, and she has sex with the Bishop of her church, who then gives her a cash loan to start her business. Bummi builds a successful cleaning company staffed by first-generation immigrant women. Among them is Sister Omofe, a Nigerian woman with whom she falls in love and has a secret affair until shame compels her to end the relationship. Bummi, like many first-generation immigrant mothers, wants Carole to have more opportunities than she and Augustine had in their home country. When Carole wants to leave Oxford, it’s Bummi who tells her that she can’t let white people scare her away from the opportunities she deserves as a native-born, English citizen. However, Bummi later regrets how Carole’s eventual success distances Carole from her Nigerian culture. Eventually, Bummi settles down with Kofi, a Ghanian man who provides her with a stable life and home and makes peace with Carole’s choices.
Bummi Williams Quotes in Girl, Woman, Other
The Girl, Woman, Other quotes below are all either spoken by Bummi Williams or refer to Bummi Williams. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 2: Carole
Quotes
did me and Papa come to this country for a better life only to see our daughter giving up on her opportunities and end up distributing paper hand towels for tips in nightclub toilets or concert venues, as is the fate of too many of our countrywomen?
you must go back to this university in January and stop thinking everybody hates you without giving them a chance, did you even ask them? did you go up to them and say, excuse me, do you hate me?
you must find the people who will want to be your friends even if they are all white people
there is someone for everyone in this world
you must go back and fight the battles that are your British birthright, Carole, as a true Nigerian
Related Characters:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 2: Bummi
Quotes
my point is that you are a Nigerian
no matter how high and mighty you think you are
no matter how English-English your future husband
no matter how English-English you pretend yourself to be
what is more, if you address me as Mother ever again I will beat you until you are dripping wet with blood and then I will hang you upside down over the balcony with the washing to dry
I be your mama
now and forever
never forget that, abi?
Bummi and Augustine agreed they were wrong to believe that in England, at least, working hard and dreaming big was one step away from achieving it
Augustine joked he was acquiring a second doctorate in shortcuts, bottlenecks, one-way streets and dead ends
while transporting passengers who thought themselves far too superior to talk to him as an equal
Bummi complained that people viewed her through what she did (a cleaner) and not what she was (an educated woman)
they did not know that curled up inside her was a parchment certificate proclaiming her a graduate of the Department of Mathematics, University of Ibadan
just as she did not know that when she strode on to the graduation podium in front of hundreds of people to receive her ribboned scroll, and shake hands with the Chancellor of the University, that her first class degree from a Third World country would mean nothing in her new country
especially with her name and nationality attached to it
Freddy arranged for Bummi to meet his parents in a London restaurant, which she was looking forward to
except he warned her that although they’d warmed to the idea of Carole, once they saw how classy, well-spoken and successful she was (most importantly for his mother, how slim and pretty, too)
they’re still old-fashioned snobs
Freddy’s father, Mark, looked uncomfortable, said little at the dinner, Carole sat there with a fake smile plastered on her face the whole time
Pamela, his mother, smiled at Bummi as if she was a famine victim, when she started explaining the meaning of hors d’oeuvres to her, Freddy told her to stop it, Mommy, just stop it
Chapter 2: LaTisha
Quotes
Losing her dad the way she did was something LaTisha never talked about; whenever people asked, she told them he’d died of a heart attack
it was easier than explaining what had happened, people thinking there must be something wrong with her and her family
else why would he leave?
she ran wild, hated school, couldn’t concentrate, even Mummy couldn’t control her and she was a social worker, I’m sending you home to Jamaica where they’ll beat some sense into you, LaTisha
yeh, whatevs, I could do with a Caribbean holiday
Get the entire Girl, Woman, Other LitChart as a printable PDF.
Bummi Williams Quotes in Girl, Woman, Other
The Girl, Woman, Other quotes below are all either spoken by Bummi Williams or refer to Bummi Williams. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Chapter 2: Carole
Quotes
did me and Papa come to this country for a better life only to see our daughter giving up on her opportunities and end up distributing paper hand towels for tips in nightclub toilets or concert venues, as is the fate of too many of our countrywomen?
you must go back to this university in January and stop thinking everybody hates you without giving them a chance, did you even ask them? did you go up to them and say, excuse me, do you hate me?
you must find the people who will want to be your friends even if they are all white people
there is someone for everyone in this world
you must go back and fight the battles that are your British birthright, Carole, as a true Nigerian
Related Characters:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 2: Bummi
Quotes
my point is that you are a Nigerian
no matter how high and mighty you think you are
no matter how English-English your future husband
no matter how English-English you pretend yourself to be
what is more, if you address me as Mother ever again I will beat you until you are dripping wet with blood and then I will hang you upside down over the balcony with the washing to dry
I be your mama
now and forever
never forget that, abi?
Bummi and Augustine agreed they were wrong to believe that in England, at least, working hard and dreaming big was one step away from achieving it
Augustine joked he was acquiring a second doctorate in shortcuts, bottlenecks, one-way streets and dead ends
while transporting passengers who thought themselves far too superior to talk to him as an equal
Bummi complained that people viewed her through what she did (a cleaner) and not what she was (an educated woman)
they did not know that curled up inside her was a parchment certificate proclaiming her a graduate of the Department of Mathematics, University of Ibadan
just as she did not know that when she strode on to the graduation podium in front of hundreds of people to receive her ribboned scroll, and shake hands with the Chancellor of the University, that her first class degree from a Third World country would mean nothing in her new country
especially with her name and nationality attached to it
Freddy arranged for Bummi to meet his parents in a London restaurant, which she was looking forward to
except he warned her that although they’d warmed to the idea of Carole, once they saw how classy, well-spoken and successful she was (most importantly for his mother, how slim and pretty, too)
they’re still old-fashioned snobs
Freddy’s father, Mark, looked uncomfortable, said little at the dinner, Carole sat there with a fake smile plastered on her face the whole time
Pamela, his mother, smiled at Bummi as if she was a famine victim, when she started explaining the meaning of hors d’oeuvres to her, Freddy told her to stop it, Mommy, just stop it
Chapter 2: LaTisha
Quotes
Losing her dad the way she did was something LaTisha never talked about; whenever people asked, she told them he’d died of a heart attack
it was easier than explaining what had happened, people thinking there must be something wrong with her and her family
else why would he leave?
she ran wild, hated school, couldn’t concentrate, even Mummy couldn’t control her and she was a social worker, I’m sending you home to Jamaica where they’ll beat some sense into you, LaTisha
yeh, whatevs, I could do with a Caribbean holiday
