Sunday, December 1, 2013

Fishbowl #5: A Long Way Gone, Chapters 15-17

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(A) Bring at least one quotation and/or page reference into at least one of your responses.

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(D) Comment frequently from the beginning of the conversation to the end.


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Enjoy!

120 comments:

  1. In A long way gone chapters 11-14, Ishmael undergoes a painful trial. He arrives to a village only to be greeted by more death and destruction, and his family's burnt carcasses. With this pain, he uses it as grip for when he eventually arrives at a resistance camp, and is told that he will have to fight for his life. When he kills his first man, he is in shock, but then he gains a hold of his courage and fights back stronger. Throughout the torment, Ishmael develops an incredible addiction to marijuana and cocaine. I am wondering if he is doing this to shelter the thought that he is a boy and will never see his family again, or does he do it to survive, and be more fearless? I can only imagine the horrors that he experienced back in sierra leone, and it makes me feel blessed that I don't have to deal with those kind of problems. "His dry blood was on my hand and I began to cry softly, I regretted punching him in the face" - Ishmael said this after Gasemu had been killed. Earlier they were in a fight and he punched him, then the rebels came and chased them and eventually killed gasemu. It shows that you must treasure every moment with someone and not fight because they can leave you at any moment.

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  2. Chapters 11-14 were very serious chapters. From finding out the death of Ish's family, to warfare, to drugs. I kind of liked how uncut these were. A lot of authors tend to leave hints as it pertains to what sort of mischief is afoot. Ishmael Beah is not one of them. Its not the gore that catches my attention, but the relentless writing style . Sadly, with the book being a short one, I assume that this is the climax to the story. For what its worth, these were great chapters. One thing I am curious about is how they mention Ishmael's "glowing head" in the beginning of Ch.11. I can't tell if its just filler, or some kind of metaphorical meaning. Maybe its just me, but that page struck me wrong.

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  3. In chapter 11 we see a connection between Ishmael and the moon. On the moonless nights he feels uncomfortable and frightened. I think Ishmael feels this way because the moon is always there when it is there. It does not suddenly flee And it also gives off light so it is easier to see at night. Therefore Ishmael would like it because it lets them see and when it is not there they can not see making him feel uncomfortable and frightened.Nature essentially becomes the base of the boys survival. Every time they have escaped it has been because of nature. I wonder if we will see this change in the future to a situation where nature is in fact against them and their intentions so to speak. Maybe this happens once Ishmael becomes a soldier and is forced to do evil things because he is told to. But if this happens i think we will see a reconciliation between the boy and nature or the moon at the end.

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  4. Ishmael faces probably the biggest and most violent point so far in his life when they finally near the village where the find out his family is alive and waiting for him. It shocked me when war broke out in the village as they nearly approached. I'm wondering if this is the last of his families mentioning throughout the book or how it will affect his combat efficiency later on. On page 99 Ishmael says, "His blood was on my palm and my wrist. I regretted hitting him with the pestle." This shows growth in Ishmael's care for others because he now is crying over someone who he barely knew.

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  5. Before chapter 11 Ishmael had described the soldiers fighting as people who seemed like they showed no mercy for anyone, they were pure evil. Ishmael had made it very clear that he hated these soldiers and everything they had done. He made very clear descriptions of what he saw them doing and how much those things had shocked him, made him angry, and scared him. however when He was forced to become a child solider all that had changed. Ishmael had become what he swore to hate.l He was doing everything that he saw the other soldiers doing before he was a solider. Ishmael was doing the same things that shocked and scarred him before. That worst part about all of this is that he seemed to enjoy what he was doing very much, whether it was the drugs or himself, he had still become someone very evil. Ishmael had began to show no mercy just like the soldiers he saw when he was younger. He was doing the same brutal things they did, "I grabbed the man's head and slit his throat in one fluid motion." The thing that concerns me most about what is going on here is how Ishmael may recover from all of this. Will it be something he can easily overcome, or will it be one of the most difficult thin gs he will have to deal with? I personally think that it will be very hard for him, Ishmael has become very used to this kind of lifestyle and he has become very addicted to many drugs. This means that he will not only have to deal with withdraw from these drugs and rehabilitation, it also means he is going to have to learn how to leave a life he has grown to like, and live one with out so much violence and brutality. I am very interested to see how Ishmael will act later on in the book.

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  6. Some things I want to bring up is the drugs that Ishmael takes. Since Ishmael is taking all these drugs, for example on page 121, “I took turns guarding posts around the village, smoking marijuana and sniffing brown brown, cocaine mixed with gun powder,” I think once he gets put into the school and stops taking the drugs he will go insane because he was relying on the drugs to function. Now he isn’t taking them at all so he will go crazy because he wants the drugs so bad. Also I think that they have turned these kids into brutal killers because on page 125 it says, “We celebrated that day’s achievement with more drugs and more war movies.” They had competitions to see who could cut open the rebels throats the fastest and Ishmael won a prize for winning. This is really brutal and just messed up and that shows what the drugs did to him because he realizes that if he kills and does it really brutally then he can get more drugs.

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  7. In Chapter 11-14 you see how violent Ishmael has become. You see that he is on drugs and has killed before. There is one statement in Chapter 12 where Ishmael shows the reader that he was still a kid at the time, he says “That night I stood at the entrance of my tent for a while, hoping my friends would come out to talk, but no one did. Alhaji stepped out and looked in my direction for a few minutes, but then turned and just stared at the ground.” (pg. 109) This relates to any teenager and also can relate to any human being. Sometimes when you feel guilty for doing something you just want to talk about it or talk about something else to take your mind off what is making you feel guilty. Since Ishmael is at such a vulnerable age and has been exposed to so much all he has is his friends. He has no family to talk about what he’s done or anything. He just wanted to talk to his friend. Also, Alhaji comes out, but just walks back in. I think he wanted to talk to Ishmael, but didn’t want to be a coward and talk about what was on his mind. I think this shows that the rebels have corrupted the minds of these children to give them the illusion that they are men, and men don’t talk about what they’ve done they celebrate with their killings and their actions.

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  8. In chapters 11-14 many big events take place. These chapters have the biggest affect on Ishmael’s life. In these chapters he is forced to kill or be killed, which would have it’s effect on any little kid. The fact that he has lost most of his friends he has been traveling with is really straining him and forcing his breaking point. He hasn’t got over the fact that he has no family anymore and continues to try to cope with being lonely. His struggles are the focus of these chapters and it really shows that he is in such a hostile environment. This type of place isn’t for a little kid but yet he is thrown into it. How will Ishmael respond from all of these tragic events and will he ever be the same? This is a question that I believe everyone is asking after reading these chapter and it is a very important question. He has gone through so much that I don’t believe that he can come back the same. On page 118 Ishmael says “I searched for Josia” he was doing this all during combat which was very risky because he could have been killed. This is important because it shows how he really values his friends which is why he took their deaths so hard. All in all, these chapters are important because they shape ishmael as a man but also they so his emotional and mental strength.

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  9. The chapters 11-14 described events that were very important to Ishmael's story, and changed the rest of his life forever. Chapter 11 started with all of them recovering after Siadu's death. That was important because that would be the first of his close friends to die. By now he was used to seeing death but it still affected him emotionally. That must have been a really hard moment for Ishmael. When they finally arrive in the soldier's village, they feel safe for the first time since the fighting started. That must have been reassuring to be able to relax for once. His family has died and he knows that already, so any source of encouragement must seem pointless. I can't imagine losing my family, and I would also want to get revenge on the people that killed them. His hatred for the rebels must have doubled after that, and he must have already hated them beyond comprehension. On page 119 he says, "Suddenly, as if someone was shooting them inside my brain, all the massacres I had seen since the day I was touched by the war began flashing in my head." Ishmael finally realizes during his first battle that he wants to kill these people because the killed his family and ended his way of life that he was so used to. Why did it take him so long to remember all that the rebels had done? I would have reacted sooner and tried to avenge those deaths the moment I saw a rebel. Now he is part of the regular soldier routine, addicted to drugs like cocaine, marijuana, brown brown and white capsules that give them energy. How will he eventually fall out of this routine? How will he get over his addictions and get his normal thinking back? He has been brainwashed and I can't imagine getting over that easily. Does the war end or does he get away somehow? I am excited to see how the rest of the book describes the next portion of his life.

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  10. I really think that so far in this story death seems to act as a motif, its all over the place in the story and seems to show itself in every chapter so far. The protagonist is suffering throughout the story and it really attaches me to him as a reader. I worry for Ishmael and feel for his suffering. "I remembered a few weeks back when Saidu had spoken about parts of him slowly dying each passing day," p 105 I believe that this quote really says a lot about how the characters feel on the inside. Has all this suffering made these men stronger, or weakened them? Has their overall determination made their psychological sate strong? I feel for these characters and worry about what will happen to them in the chapters to come.

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  11. I really enjoyed chapters 11-14. I never could imagine a child soldier as far as an emotional standpoint goes. But reading about Ishmael's first battle was both scary and eye opening. the small passage on page 117 really leaves a mark in my mind "The top of my eyes began to ache and the pain slowly rose up to my head. My ears became warm and tears were running down my cheeks, even though i wasn't crying. The veins on my arms stood out and I could feel the pulsating as if they had begun to breath of their own accord." This truly shows how horrible the fear of death is. Ishmael's entire body was in this constant state of action during chapter 13. Seeing his friends die and having blood splattered all over him at such a young age really changes a person. After this chapter he was officially a killer and I can now understand why he had trouble forgiving himself.

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  12. Chapters 11-14 are when Ishmael begins to become a child soldier and it is when his brain becomes addicted to violence. Often times Ishmael gains a sense of false hope only to have it shattered. He displays perseverance by continuing to move on. They boys join the child soldiers and they are motivated with revenge. Ishmael's commander says "visualize the enemy, the rebels who killed your parents, your family, and those who are responsible for everything that has happened to you." pg 112. Eventually this revenge leads to hatred and it turns Ishmael into a savage. Ishmael experiences a loss of innocence because he is no longer a child, just a soldier. He also becomes addicted to drugs which allow him to perform better. Violence becomes a form of entertainment for Ishmael. I think a motif in these chapters is stimulants, because Ishmael is stimulated physically with drugs and mentally with what his commander says to become addicted to war.

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  13. In chapter 14 Ishmael strongly relies on drugs to keep him calm. He smokes marijuana and takes the white energy pills very often. He also snorts brown brown which is a mixture of cocaine and gunpowder. This chapter mainly focuses on what the soldiers do. They go to small villages and attack them to get more kid soldiers. The significance is that the drugs take over Ishmael and the soldiers brains, and keeps them calm and the drugs make them not care when he is attacking innocent civilians in villages. The drugs really help the soldiers enjoy what they are doing. On page 123, After all the soldiers attacked villages, they slit an innocent mans throat, and they all laughed. "He fell to the ground and blood slowly leaked from his head, we all started to cheer loudly." This quote proves that drugs really take over the soldiers minds and help make doing horrible things to people easier. Do you think drugs are making Ishmael happy? Is their any significance to rap music anymore?

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  14. I feel like the army that Ishmael joins is no different than the Rebels. They do the exact same thing as the Rebels and kill without a motive. The commanding officers also fuel the boys with drugs to make them feel nothing when they kill, it also makes them almost never tired. I feel that at this point in the book Ishmael is at his all time low, because it says he feels numb to everything he is doing which includes killing people in a ruthless manner for no reason and being so hopped up on drugs. I dont think at any age this is okay for anyone to act like this but especially when they group of boys range from seven to sixteen makes it so much worse I cannot imagine what they went through. This army is almost identical to the Rebels but the Lieutenant makes them think they are doing the right thing when they kill the Rebels which is no different from them.

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  15. The story of Ishmael Bead's childhood is horrific. There are few word if any I can use to describe what he might of been going through mentally. He spends weeks trying to find his family just to find that they were all killed. I can't imagine what that must be like especially at his age, he is just a kid. "I was filled up with anger. I hissed and boiled, and my heart felt as if it was going to explode. At the same time, I felt as if something had literally been placed on my head, heavier than I could imagine." In the first chapter, it flashed to his life in New York. Can he ever fully recover from the horrors he experienced in his life? The addiction to the drugs? The death of his family? I do not think anyone can recover. Is it even really Ishmael anymore? The drugs get him through his duties as a child soldier and he seem mentally dead. This book is horribly sad and the fact that this is a true story and thousands of kids experience this too is very sad and almost unbelievable.

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  16. "They were laughing and giving each other high fives. Two looked slightly older than me. They had blood on their clothes, and one of them carried the head of a man, which he held by the hair." (Pg 96) As I read through the chapters I was thinking that these thinks will be very significance in the book and these are things that will scar his life forever. This is a big part of the book because he knows now that his family is dead. In the next chapter it shows when he if first captured and when they start training him to become a soldier and he is terrified at what he sees. But one of the older soldiers said that he will get used to it. Once he is trained it tells about him killing people and this will effect him for the rest of his life. The last thing that I think is very important in this chapter is it shows how he became addicted to the drugs that they gave the the kids and how this the way they gain power over them. That is the importance of these chapters to me.

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  17. My thinking on what was happening in Chapters 11-14 was in Chapter 11 Ishmael's family died to the rebels. He went on with rage filled sorrows and joined the Sierra Leone army as a young boy. He very quickly gets addicted to "brown brown", which is cocaine mixed with gunpowder. He takes white pills and smoked marijuana. The rage of his family's death puts all of the hatred that could be brought out against the rebels. The war scenes are very violent with Ishmael cutting people's throats and shooting his opposition with his AK. Although the young boy is a soldier on drugs, he still has feelings of fear and of his lost family as he is fighting. The drugs take away all of his control though and make it so all of the corrupt boys will fight to their deaths. The Rebels and Army are against each other, but when someone compares the two opposing sides, they really are not that different and very similar. The boys do not only kill but raid and steal from the villages they infiltrate. I really think that Ishmael will become heavily addicted to the drugs he has been given and that will mess with his head as well as the sounds and images of war.

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  18. In chapters 11 through 14 Ishmael becomes a man and a soldier. Whats left of the group gets captured and are trained to how to use AK-47s and bayonets to kill the rebels. Through all of the training the soldiers keep telling the boys that its okay to kill because the rebels killed their families. In battles they are given white pills that make them have more energy. Ishmael gets addicted to the drugs. Ishmael had a competition with the Corporal to see how fast they could cut open the rebels throats. When his rap music was burned I think it was like his moment of becoming a man. I think taking all of the drugs and relying on them to function will have a long term affect on Ishmael. Also Ishmael seeing dead bodies doesn't faze him anymore. He is becoming a brutal kid and a brutal soldier.

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    1. " We had been walking in silence throughout the night until we stopped to listen to the singing of the morning birds shattering the silence of the day." I think this is important and keeps the boys sanity.

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  19. During these chapters Ishmael has gone through alot with his parents being killed, being forced to join the Army, killing a lot of people, and being taken to UNICEF. Ishmael was a scared little boy until his parents died, and until the Army. The Army made Ishmael fearless and a killer. “ Every time I stopped shooting the change magazines and saw my two young lifeless friends, I angrily pointed my gun into the swamp and killed more people. I shot everything that moved, until we were ordered to retreat...” Ishmael hated people with a gun and shooting. He swore to himself that he would never become that ever. But it seemed after he witnessed his parents death, and the army training, he became a monster. He had become what he swore he never would be. Maybe the drugs had helped him become this monster? Why had he changed for this? Also in the book you see UNICEF take in kids from the war and are moving them somewhere else. As soon as they get there, there is already conflict with the army kids and the rebellion. I think some kids will die with all of them hating each other and the previous addiction to drugs. I wonder what will happen next with Ishmael and where he will go.

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  20. First i had a question about Ishmael. Why does Ishmael’s demeanor change so fast? I understand that he has to change because he is in the war and he has to mature but made it good that he was fully mature yet. In chapter 14 i thought it was strange that they had a competition to see who could cut open a rebels throats the fastest. Ishmael won, and the prize was more drugs and movies. I was wondering how many drugs are these kids on. and what kind of movie do they watch?

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  21. In chapter 13 i thought the child soldiers was a significant part in theses chapters because he had to find way of growing up. Also Ishmael was kinda forced to growing up fast, with out no choice, they gave him guns, and made him take drugs something a young kid shouldn't take at that age or ever for that matter and its heart breaking to see different types of sights to killing and violence. Another thing would be he was forced to grow up fast because he was a boy soldier that was force to the front lines of war and was force to kill. they also train him to use a gun. In chapter 13 this quote explains him becoming a soldier, " carry on with the game right now i want to see my soldiers play soccer." pg 114. This quote is very similar to him becoming a soldier because you just have to carry on and live through the pain that your in. Another thing this quote is saying would be you have to put all your effort in to what your doing.

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  22. In this chapters Ishmael begins to change. Ishmael has no other choice but to turn to violence. He has no other choice but to join the militia, once he joins he completely changes. We see that he is savage at the end of chapter 14 when he says "We celebrated that day's achievement with more drugs and more war movies." This shows how he changed because before that they had a competition to see who could kill the prisoners faster.Towards the end of this chapters he becomes savage because he can't control himself.

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  23. In these chapters we start to see that what is happening is turning them into savages. The boys are getting desperate and therefore they will do anything to survive and they are willing to fight. In chapter 11 Ishmael attacks Gasemu just because of frustration in anger. Could this anger in him lead to later and further acts of destruction. Later on in chapter 12 they boys and Ishmael are captured by a group of soldiers and are taken to a village Yele. Weeks later they notice that it is surrounded by rebels and the only two options are to run or to stay and fight . The boys get Ak47’s so they can fight off the rebels and kill them with the bayonets. Guns are not the only thing they are giving to fight. Each boy is given a white tablet to "boost their energy" so they will be able to fight with no constraint and lots of energy. Could these drugs be harmful to him later on and could it make him too confident that will lead to him getting killed? These drugs are not short term , they have long term effects that affect the brain and the ability to work. Ishmael will later use these pills as a solution to calm himself down because he is addicted .In Chapter 14, Ishmael is brainwashed and drugged. He finds himself enjoying all of the killing that he is doing. Do you think that Ishmael could ever learn to forgive himself?

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  24. How has Ishmael's time of being a boy soldier really effected him? How has he changed?

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    1. When your in war you see things that you can never forget. And in Ishmael's situation it is almost worse because all the violence is happening directly in his home. Not to mention he didn't really have the choice whether he wanted to fight or not. It was that or die anyways.

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    2. He has become a witness to violence at such a young age, which has made him both weaker and stronger, he has learned to be on his toes at all moments of the day and he has also become a true warrior.

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    3. It's like when you're a kid and you see your fist action movie. The hero of the story becomes your hero at heart and you want to be more and more like the hero. So, you start acting more and more like (Or try to at least) That's the same way with Ishmael he goes into warfare and sees all these "Heroes" and the heroes are telling you to become a man you have to do drugs, and you see these men kill other men and this drives you to be more like them and to impress them. That is what Ishmael is going threw.

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  25. I think that the drugs right now are controlling him and are used as a way out of violence/to calm him down. For instance when Ishmael was going crazy the rebels gave hi pills to go to sleep because he was having nightmares

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    1. I think that the drugs are controlling Ishmael's life. I think that he would leave and stop if he could but he cant because he has a horrible addiction. On page 128, the boys are having a conversation, "We chatted all night, mostly about how good the drugs were." The drugs are changing Ishmael.

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    2. The drugs were used to control him and the other boys. If the had not been so drugged up then they may not have so willingly fought for the army.

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  26. Now that Ishmael is a spokesperson will he find a real career and could Ishmael potentially make a lot of money off of talking about his experience?

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    1. I think he can if he really wants to he can make a career out of it.

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    2. Definitely, I think that through the horrors that hes witnessed, his story is nothing short of iconic.

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    3. I don't think he wants to make it a career as much as he wants raise awareness to the countries that are forcing war into kids lives by having child soldiers.

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  27. I don't think that he will forgive himself later on, kinda like the kite runner and how Amir needed redemption from his, "Sins"

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    1. That is a great connection between the books and I agree he can't take back what he did but he still has time to make up for what he did.

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  28. I think Ishmael would want to go back to the war zone bacause he is consumed by the violence and because of the drugs he is addicted to the violence and war

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    1. I agree. He has clearly showed his violent behavior and his desire to kill rebels.

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  29. After Ishmael's time in the war, he has migraines induced from his war experiences and they are extremely painful for him. Could the migraines symbolize the memories he is trying to repress.

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  30. Because he no longer has the drugs to keep him going and give him energy how hard will the withdraws and absence of drugs affect him? Do you think he will do something crazy because of what he is going through without the drugs.

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    1. I just think without the drugs he is becoming more angry and more impatient. It's like waking up from a nap, when you wake up you're really cranky cause your still tired, but its actually because your body wants sleep and that's what makes you cranky and upset. Ishmael wants the drugs and is becoming upset and the withdrawal is driving him crazy.

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  31. On page 137 Ishmael states, "My head hurts." This was because of all of the drugs he is still addicted to and abused just a short time before. The drugs, brown brown coke and the white capsules, are highly addictive and gave him a painless escape from his headaches. Do you think he will be able to quit them all, or just crave them more later on in his life?

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    1. Well obviously for now he's going to be going through withdrawals because he is still addicted to them but later in life, if he continues not to use them, will grow out of the addiction.

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    2. While he is in the Benin house, the rehabilitation center, he goes through withdrawal and overcomes his addictions.

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    3. It depends on if he tries. He uses these drugs to control himself sleep and kill. I don't think it will be easy to quit these drugs but it is possible.

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    4. After several years his cravings will eventually subside, if he stays off drugs.

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  32. Drugs are such a large part of Ishmael s life now. He uses them to stay calm, and leave his past behind. On page 124 he says, "the man fell to the floor, blood leaking from his head..... we cheered." In this quote a man had his throat slit and his head beaten and the men laughed. The men only laughed at the dead man because they were on drugs. Drugs are the only thing these men have.

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    1. Before he was using drugs he was scared to see dead bodies, but now hes a ruthless killer. I don't see how Ishmael could get off of the drugs without going through withdrawals because there is no medical help in Sierra Leonne

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  33. On page 142 Ishmael says "The lieutenant and Corporal Gadafi had selected all my remaining friends- Alhaji, Kanei, Jumah, and Moriba- to form the unit, and once again we were back together. Only this time we weren't running away from the war. We were in it" How do you think that makes Ishmael feel? The fact that at one point they feared the fact of being put into warfare, and now they are taking lives and watching others take a life. You see Ishmael and his friends change, do you think that it is because of the drugs, or because it makes them feel like men?

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  34. Do you guys think that when this is all set and done, will they still be savages or will they have a way of humanity.?

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    1. I don't think they will ever be the same because he has savagely killed several, even if the survive the war, his past will always haunt him.

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  35. Ishmael is currently trying his hardest to avoid rehabilitation because he is a boy soldier who is trained to kill and only kill. He acts prideful for a while, but when he finds out that he has an uncle, he begins to lighten up. I can only begin to understand how he feels, with his family constantly being taken away and then suddenly there is a spark and he has even more family.

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  36. A motif that i noticed throughout these chapters was the line "This isn't your fault you know." At first it upsets Ishmael but then he realizes that maybe it isn't his fault. I think this is a major turning point in the book.

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  37. Ishmael's savage ways will calm down at some point, staying like this forever will cause him to get in trouble.

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  38. Do you think that all the Rebels were innocent before they were drugged up?

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  39. Why do you think that Ishmael attacked everyone trying to help him after he'd been released?

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  40. No I do not think that Ishmael will stay a savage, but for a while he will be. The nurse helps him with rap music which he likes and in chapter 17 he receives some tapes. It reminds him of his past and needs to remember his lifer before the war and being a soldier.

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  41. No i dont think they will always be savage but they also will always have that experience with them and it will always effect the way they think about everything. But as we know Ishmael grows older and moves to America and writes a book on his experiences, he obviously is not sage today and he hasn't been for a while.

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  42. On page 126 Ishmael says "I felt no pity for anyone", Is this the new Ishmael and is this what fighting has really turned him into. Because of this change is there any hope for Ishmael to ever return to normal and if so how could he return to normalcy.

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  43. On page 139 it says" Sometimes I searched in the pockets of my army shorts, which I still wore, for crumbs of marijuana and cocaine." Do you think that not having the drugs around them will affect them?

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    1. Well he is used to taking the drugs pretty much all day every day so now that he no longer has the drugs he will definitely be affected by not having them and it will definitely have a negative affect on him and his mental and physical state.

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    2. Yes because the drugs are helping them not think or care when they kill innocent people. Without drugs they will be scared of themselves and each other. They will become sane again. Drugs keep them happy and willing to do their tragic orders.

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  44. I am curious to see if ishmael will remain safe, or will there be another rebel related attack? I think something bad is coming, and ishmael will be forced to re live his horrible memorys again. I hope that he remains physically strong and will find a way through all the bad things he's been through

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  45. How do you think Ishmael's drug addiction will affect his combat when he doesn't have the drugs to keep him going?

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    1. I do not believe that Ishmael will be as violent because he now has started to show signs of calming down and returning to a more normal life.

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    2. I think Ishmael is lost without drugs. He will be terrified of the situation hes in, and end up getting himself killed. I think drugs help him do what he is told, and enjoy it too.

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  46. As the truck began to pull away from the base, I started boiling with anger, because I couldn’t make sense of what was happening. Alhaji looked at me with a puzzled face. I looked at the guns the MPs carried and envied them. The men who had come to get us smiled as the truck sped along the dirt road. I had no idea where we were going.” on page 141 what is this quote saying?

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  47. “It took several months before I began to relearn how to sleep without the aid of medicine. But even when I was finally able to fall asleep, I would start awake less than an hour later."(138) According to these quotes what do you think the drugs are a symbol of ?

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    1. The drugs are a part of the stimulation that Ishmael receives while he is in the war, the drugs stimulate him physically and the commanders stimulate him mentally by using revenge, they tell the boys that the rebels are the reason why your family died. These two combinations make him a savage, the drugs aren't necessarily a symbol but they are a stimulation.

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  48. On page 160, Ishmael states "I tried to think about my childhood days but it was impossible." How has the war affected Ishmael's mental being, he wants to remember but he can't. He is so focused on the war.

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  49. Should we blame the Rebels for all these killings, or the one who is making them kill?

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    1. I believe it could be both. Some of these boy soldiers are most likely bad and some are good. But the ones making them kill are all bad and im sure of this.

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  50. How do we see nature play a role in these chapters?

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  51. In chapter 16 i think this is an important passage. “It took several months before I began to relearn how to sleep without the aid of medicine. But even when I was finally able to fall asleep, I would start awake less than an hour later. I would dream that a faceless gunman had tied me up and begun to slit my throat with the zigzag edge of his bayonet. I would feel the pain that the knife inflicted as the man sawed my neck. I’d wake up sweating and throwing punches in the air. I would run outside to the middle of the soccer field and rock back and forth, my arms wrapped around my legs. I would try desperately to think about my childhood, but i couldn’t. The war memories had formed a barrier that I had to break in order to think about any moment in my life before the war.”

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  52. Rap music serves as a reminder of his past. Even when he listens he can kind of remember who he used to be. On page 154 Ish says "I didn't care because the song had taken hold of me." This proves how much he loves rap, thus is a key to himself.

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  53. On pg, 159 it says that "When I finished telling esther the story, she had tears in her eyes. She couldnt decide whether to rub me or hug me" I think this is powerful to say that a young boys experience can make a grown women cry because of the powerful detail that he goes into. It comes to show that the war has left a large scar upon the earth.

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  54. Why do we cheer for Ishmael when he is doing the same crimes as the Rebels?

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    1. We feel sympathy for Ishmael because he was forced into fighting and the reader knows what has happened to him so far. We cheer for the kid who likes rap music and dancing, not the kid who slices throats.

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    2. We cheer for Ishmael because we only see it from his point of view and not the rebels point of view. Also we cheer for Ishmael because the rebels have done so much to him and like Hobey said we feel sympathy for him.

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    3. Because we see that Ishmael use to be good and we hope there is still good in his heart. And we know he does because of his thoughts and we hope he will just get out of this mess.

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  55. Do you think the schooling the boys went through was a kind of therapy to stop the boys from out bursting with violence? Almost as a way to counteract the violence with education.

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    1. yes that is the underlying theme in the book. Education to prevent violence and make people aware of violence in the world.

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    2. Yes potentially. It could be being used to take their minds out of this violent state to a better state where they do not posses this "Kill or be killed" mentality

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  56. In response to the question of whether Ishmael's life will ever be normal again, I don't think it will ever be normal because his family is dead, and hes gone through a lot since the war started. Hes killed people for competition and is addicted to drugs so I don't see how his life could be the same again.

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  57. Do you think ishmaels drug addiction will effect him later on in the future?

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    1. Yes, because the drugs are gonna wear off and I think its going to make him angry that he is not on the drugs. Also, it is going to be hard for him because he had been on the drugs for a long time and he is addicted to them.

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    2. Yes i believe it will be one of the biggest things that shape him as a person in his future.

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  58. On page 141 while Ishmael is in he hospital he says " I fainted from a migraine while I was sitting on the verandah." Do you think the migraines are an effect of the wars that they were in?

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    1. I think that they could very well be an affect from the continued use of all the drugs that he has consumed.

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    2. The migraines are a result of drug withdrawal.

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  59. on page 145. “It had been more than a month and some of us had almost gone through the withdrawl stage , even though there were still instances of vomiting and collapsing at unexpected moments. These outbreaks ended, for most of us, at the end of the second month. But we were still traumitized, and now that we had time to think, the fastened mantle of our war memories slowly began to open.” what exactly does this quote mean?

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  60. I agree, its hard on Ish more so because he feels guilty, and the nurse knows this. She is trying desperately to stop him feeling that way.

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  61. In chapter 15 we see the conflict of man vs. society when the boy soldiers are fighting against the culture that is trying to free them from their brainwashing enslavement. What other conflicts exist in these chapters?

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    1. A mental conflict exists between Ishmael and himself. He struggles to remember his past but he slowly overcomes this.

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  62. I am thinking that his withdrawals away from drugs is a very good thing as a part of his rehabilitation. The drugs were what drove him to be fierce and strong throughout the war, and taking away the drug will help remove his natural reaction to kill and do more drugs. If the war didnt kill him, the cocain could have. In the end, ishmael is pretty much saved, as far as it comes to being in active combat.

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  63. Both the army and the rebels have their views and reason to fight. Both sides have done their dirt.

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  64. On page 142, the book reads, "The lieutenant and Corporal Gadafi had selected all of my remaining friends- Alhaji, Kanei, Jumah, and Moriba- to form a unit, and once again we were back together. Only this time we were not running from the war. We were it..." I think this line is very powerful. It shows how the book has progressed. How do you think this makes the Ishmael and the boys feel?

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  65. Do you think the boys will ever get over their hate for the RUF?

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  66. on page 154 i think this is a very inportant passage in the story, when the nurse gives Ishmael a Walkman. “She threw a package at me. I held it in my hands, wondering what it was and why she had gotten it for me. She was looking at me, waiting for me to open it. When I unwrapped it, I jumped up and hugged her, but immediately held back my happiness.”

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  67. On page 149 Ishmael says, "It took several months before I began to relearn how to sleep without medicine." He may be able to sleep now without the help of medical aid at this time, but I believe that it truly is the images of war. He talks about waking up just an hour later and not be able to have peaceful dreams. He says that he wants to return to his childhood. I think that he will be affected and scarred but he will not show it on the outside once he moves to New York.

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  68. In chapter 16 we see how naturally violent the boys are. Why do you think they are acting so violent against people who only have good intentions? Why?

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  69. I think ishmael will avoid his past to look forward to a new life, since he didnt really have one back in sierra leone. Its funny to think that his new life would be to write a book about his life and make a fortune off of an inspiring story. I've learned to be more grateful once I had started to read this book.

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  70. I dont think that he will be-able to forget his violent past because it is so treacherous and kinda like the kite runner Amir wasn't capable of forgetting what happened. Every thing that has happened to Ismael is scared and will always be with him

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  71. The only way for Ishmael to be relieved from his mental pain is by telling other people so he can "get" the pain out of him. We see this start to occur when he begins to open up to the nurse he starts to achieve greater things.

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  72. I responds to Byran's question, "How long will Ishmael hold onto his violent past," I'm not sure he ever lets it go. He is going to live with it for the rest of his life.

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  73. In the rehab camp they try and make the boys feel like children again, with the experience of war taking away their childhood do you think now they will hold onto their childhood they are being given longer if he hadn't been involved in the war?

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  74. I think Ishmael is a long way gone from his normal life. To return he must stop and let go of being a child soldier.

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  75. Ishmael is a long way gone from his childhood, which was brutally taken from him, and going through the treatment and being aloud to live that care free life that kids have should save him. To me this book is the story about how he gets his childhood back, if its not too late.

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  76. Ishmael is "a long way gone" from his childish mental state and from his family. The only way he can recover is by telling his story to other people to relieve his pain, he does this and he goes to America to tell his story. He is becoming a child once again.

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  77. I think he's a long way gone from his life. What I mean is that he is basically a long way gone from his childhood, his family, everything. And the only real way to get back is to try and end or leave the war. He needs to do that in order to come back from his long way gone.

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  78. I think he is a long way gone from his home and he is a long way gone from himself.

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  79. I think that he is a LONG WAY GONE from his childhood. He has changed from himself. He was for not killing and running and now he is killing and is savage.

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  80. I think he is a long way gone from himself because he is killing people and doing drugs and hes not himself anymore. I also think he is a long way gone from humanity because he loses his morality and he isn't really a person anymore hes just a child soldier now.

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  81. Ishmael is a long way gone from everything he knows. Everything that he is now experiencing is a long way gone from what he is used to. In order to come back to what he is used to he must become normal again. That sounds easy but it's really not. He has to push everything out of his past and completely restart again.

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  82. Ishmael is a long way gone from his family, and home. He needs to quit drugs in order to regain it all back. Like Danny said he is gone from him self, and when he takes drugs the farther he pushes away from himself. The drugs really turn him into a monster and make him kill innocent lives. If he quit he could become sane and realize what he is doing and stop.

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  83. Ishmael Beah is a long way gone from his own willpower. He is violent and uncontrollable. He has no will power to think for himself he is under the influence of whether he is impressing the general or not. He has no control over choosing whether or not to do drugs or not. He is a long way gone from his own willpower and his power of choice.

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  84. Ishmael is a long way gone from his childhood he always imagined he'd have. A childhood where he can be happy and walk around without a worry in his mind. Where he could sit with the entire family and enjoy a nice dinner. Hes a long way gone in a place filled with death, assertiveness, and pure ferociousness. A life now filled with moments of life or death danger. Fueled by drugs he cannot ever grow out of the situation. Until the drugs are done and the war is over, he can never really grow out of it, let alone recover.

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  85. Ishmael is a long way gone from the life he knew before the war. Before all of this started he had a life in his village with his friends and his dancing, but now he has drugs and killing in his life.

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  86. Whats next in Ishmaels journey?

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