Half Walls Between Us Analysis

In “Half Walls between Us,” imagery is strongly expressed through Maria Said’s choice of words. For example, Said says, “On my first visit to Agordat, a small town in Eritrea, a country in the Horn of Africa, I fell in love with its mystery, its quiet, its soft sandy colors,” which gives a strong image of the setting (Said 79). To express strong imagery is to give great detail, explain settings, and compare and contrast the surroundings. To have imagery in a story or essay is to give visual effects for the reader to see while being intrigued into a new story. Giving great details to express imagery in “Half Walls between Us” shows the different places and sights she has seen. Said describes many unusual events within her household and living, she did not picture to live where she is, but she accepts the half built home. According to Said, the walls were not fully built, barely met to her needs, as she said, “When a townsman finally showed me an empty place, the fact that the walls reached only to the level of my head seemed like a minor inconvenience,” (Said 79). Explaining the setting to readers helps visualize where she was, and the experiences she had with the weather and her temporary home. As Said talked about her neighbors and

First, Maria thought of the stereotypical views of a desert and living in a hut until she found out living in the desert is completely different. Living in the desert actually accomodates of half built, crowded homes. The streets are different from America, as Said says, “ At any hour of the day, one could look out onto the street and see a camel in midstep, a child with a finger in his mouth, a local tribesman carrying baskets suspended from the ends of a pole laid across his bony shoulders,” to describe the streets, but as any American knows that is not normal in the United