The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind

by

William Kamkwamba

Day labor or piece work that villagers do to earn money or as a last resort for food when they cannot work on their own farms.

Ganyu Quotes in The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind

The The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind quotes below are all either spoken by Ganyu or refer to Ganyu. For each quote, you can also see the other terms and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Rebirth, Recycling, and Reinvention Theme Icon
).
Chapter 13 Quotes

In Malawi, we say these people are “grooving” through life, just living off small ganyu and having no real plan. I started worrying that I would become like them, that one day the windmill project would lose its excitement or become too difficult to maintain, and all my ambitions would fade into the maize rows. Forgetting dreams is easy. To fight that kind of darkness, I kept returning to the library every week.

Related Characters: William Kamkwamba (speaker)
Related Symbols: The Windmill
Page Number: 224
Explanation and Analysis:
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The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind PDF

Ganyu Term Timeline in The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind

The timeline below shows where the term Ganyu appears in The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 5
The Business of Survival Theme Icon
...women has gathered. Gilbert explains that these women have come from smaller villages looking for ganyu, or day work, to feed their families during the hunger season. Usually these women can... (full context)
The Business of Survival Theme Icon
...other food such as mangos and pumpkin leaves. William’s neighbor gives out unripe mangos for ganyu. A few days later, William notices traders selling gaga, the clear husks of corn, that... (full context)
The Business of Survival Theme Icon
...as before. As maize gets even scarcer, more strangers come to William’s village looking for ganyu in exchange for roots and leaves that no Malawian would normally consider food. Maize is... (full context)
Chapter 6
The Business of Survival Theme Icon
Malawian Culture and African Community Theme Icon
...maize and a half acre of tobacco, though many farmers are so busy looking for ganyu that they ignore their own fields. Migrant workers take longer hours for even less food... (full context)
The Business of Survival Theme Icon
Malawian Culture and African Community Theme Icon
...lunch of a blob of nsima, William goes to visit Geoffrey. Geoffrey now looks for ganyu each day instead of working on the farm, and is continuing to lose weight from... (full context)
Chapter 8
The Business of Survival Theme Icon
Malawian Culture and African Community Theme Icon
...harvest, people smile and chatter in the street instead of speaking only of hunger and ganyu. However, the dowe also brings thieves who creep into fields at night and devour all... (full context)
Chapter 9
Rebirth, Recycling, and Reinvention Theme Icon
Education and Entrepreneurship Theme Icon
...of Daud’s shop at the trading center. He considers earning the five hundred kwacha through ganyu, then realizes that this prototype windmill could actually use a smaller generator such as a... (full context)
Chapter 10
Rebirth, Recycling, and Reinvention Theme Icon
Education and Entrepreneurship Theme Icon
Science vs. Superstition and Magic Theme Icon
...all the scrap yard bolts are too rusted to use. William earns 200 kwacha working ganyu and is able to pay a welder, Mister Godsten, to weld together his shock absorber... (full context)