1. “The woman who’d tugged my plait was looking at her fingers and rubbing them together, frowning. […] I hear it smells like shit because it is shit.” (Ursala Le. Guin, 16)
When these Khoush women encounter Binti in the shuttle port there first instinct is to touch her and talk about her as if she isn’t even there. This is ultimately a mixed encounter for both the people involved. The only truly satisfied party is all the gossipy women who now have a story to tell their generic families. But they also find her disgusting so I’m sure they view it as a negative having to share the same air as her. For Binti the encounter is mostly negative, she has to just stand there and take it while people insult her and ignore her. However, she is getting to learn firsthand that the some Khoush people will offend her l have no regard for her feelings. Better to learn this now in person than trying to grasp this from listening to someone else. I think that knowing that she experienced this firsthand and still chose to defend them, just goes to show how great of a person Binti is.
2. “I felt someone pick up one of my plaits and I whirled around, ready to be angry. […] I couldn’t help it, he said, his fingertips reddish with my otjize. […] is it some sort of code?” (Ursala Le. Guin, 23)
Although very similar to the first quote, both the reactions and the motivations were very different. First of all for Binti this encounter started off negative, she was sick of people messing with her hair and she had enough confidence to stand up for herself, when she realizes that he is just curious (and also super cute) she loses that anger. For Heru this encounter seems to be completely positive, he clearly didn’t need to touch her hair in order to observe the code, but he probably wanted to strike up a conversation with her. He seems unfazed by her anger and is probably only disappointing that he didn’t get to know her better. He is also a Khoush which means he has been raised by the same people that called her a dirt bather. I truly hope that he was coming from a kind place and not a intolerant one.
3. “The Meduse were hovering less than a foot away. One had launched itself at me but then froze an inch from my flesh, […] it quickly dried up like a dead leaf.” (Ursala Le. Guin, 25)
This encounter was definitely negative for both parties involved. More so for Binti who had to watch her friends and hundreds of other people getting brutally murdered. However, the Meduse might appear stoic and uncaring but they are afraid of Binti. She is something new, something evil. She has the power to hurt them and she is a lower being. I don’t see anyway this could’ve been positive. Either the humans die, the meduse die, or both. There was no compromise to be made on that ship. On Oozma Uni they had Binti as an embassador, and had she not lived through the massacre their would have been another. The outcome may have been positive, but the encounter was anything but. When Binti first meets them she is taken aback by how different and terrifying they are, but as she gets to know one, she starts being able to recognize their subtle emotions and reactions. This is what helps her start to see them as intelligent equals instead of alien invaders. And what eventually helps her work up the nerve to help them.
4. “You’re so ugly now Binti, you don’t even sound the same. You’re polluted.” (Ursala Le. Guin, Binti Home, 73)
Although her family is nothing new for her, and this certainly isn’t her first time meeting them, this is her first time meeting them as an outsider. At first they greet her with love and hugs, but that love and acceptance soon turns to hate and confusion. They aren’t meeting an outsider, but rather Binti’s true self, someone they’ve chosen to ignore for a very long time. She is finally doing things she wants to, instead of what her family and friends expect her to. And this terrifies them. The reason this encounter is so negative for both parties is because her family can’t accepted her as anything other than what they tried to mold her into. She comes back with alien hair and they use that as an excuse to say she’s changed into something alien, but she has never been closer to her human self. She needs to learn to control her newfound meduse anger, but they are a direct and calculated people, and it would make sense that she picks up those traits as well.
5. ” Just like every Himba I have ever encountered, like we’re savages, you call us the ‘Desert people,’mysterious uncivilized dark people of the sand.” (Ursala Le. Guin, Binti Home, 123)
The Desert People are like a final frontier for Binti. She’s met thousands of species from all over the galaxy. But she comes home and meets a people she has written off as crazy, and she discovers they are not at all what she thought. They treat her well and accept her as one of the own, which is more than what can be said for Binti’s family. And because they accept her the experience is a little disorienting, but overall quite positive for both parties. She has to face the family she never knew she had and she never understood. And now that she does get to know them and she learns about their alien heritage she realizes that they are not so different after all. She is part of them and they are part of her, and they always have been, passionately waiting for the right time to tell her. I believe they chose now because she is open to these things and she is willing to act in her own self interest instead of that of her families.
Cats and Books 