Pigeon English

This section opens on the crime scene of the dead boy outside of Chicken Joe’s. The neighborhood has shown up to offer flowers and other tokens of sympathy in light of the shocking tragedy. Harri’s stream of consciousness provides cursory detail about the deceased, as he remarks on the dead boy’s athleticism and how they were only “half-friends,” since Harri is younger. However, Harri’s desire to solve the crime stems from his awareness that the dead boy was a good person. He remarks: “I said a prayer for him inside my head. It just said sorry. That’s all I could remember. I pretended like if I kept looking hard enough I could make the blood move and go back in the shape of a boy” (4). He observes the crowd and mulls over the nature of death. At the dead boy’s funeral, Harri and Dean begin their official investigation in search of the killer, carefully observing all of the attendees and looking for signs of guilt.

Readers are familiarized with Harri’s basic biographical information: he is in Year 7 at his school, he is the fastest runner in his year, and he and his family live on the ninth floor of their fourteen-floor tower. Harri also details his gradual immersion into British culture, remarking early on about language: “In England there’s a hell of different words for everything. It’s for if you forget one, there’s always another one left over. It’s very helpful. Gay and dumb and lame mean all the same” (5-6). He provides a gradual overview of the children in his neighborhood and at school through his quick anecdotes about word-play tricks (for instance, how Connor Green likes to ask, “do you have happiness?” because it sounds like “do you have a penis?”) and the games they play together in order to score points against one another.

Harri also introduces his pigeon, who “visits” him on the balcony of the tower where he and his family live. In the first internal monologue from the pigeon, the bird states, “I watched the sun come up and saw the boy off to school, I start every day with the taste of his dreams in my mouth” (26). Though his Mamma discourages feeding the pigeon, Harri continues to leave feed out for him, coaxing him back, if only to have a conversation with him.

Harri stands out in his community of children because of his ardent religious beliefs, which none of his close friends share. Many of his observations of his world link back to his religion, especially as a means for understanding how and why things happen the way that they do.

Despite his childlike innocence, early on we witness Harri’s immediate disgust for Lydia’s friend, Miquita, who is closely associated with the Dell Farm Crew, and sexually harasses Harri and teases him whenever she is over at the apartment. Harri is approached by the leader of the Dell Farm Crew, X-Fire, who steals Harri’s bag and says he will return it if Harri “does a job” for him, which Harri does not fully understand and replies to by saying he is not in need of a job.