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A Long Way Gone Ishmael Beah Character Analysis

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Many times, others view unknown situations or topics as “cool”. Many times, they fail to realize the hardships others face. In “A Long Way Gone”, Beah’s friends had thought his experiences were cool but they would not feel the same way if they had read the memoir and understood the emotions and situations he had faced. Ishmael Beah’s memoir goes on to explain all the reasons why his experiences were not nearly cool. While Beah was fighting, he was given drugs to make him feel more energetic and fierce. “Stopped only to eat sardines… sniff cocaine, brown brown, and take some white capsules. The combination of these drugs gave us a lot of energy and made us fierce. Killing had become as easy as drinking water.” (Chapter 14) After inhaling these drugs, they didn’t receive the typical euphoric high. As a result, they went out to fight and were not fazed by the killing of other human beings. He feels as he is invincible and not capable of death and suddenly is no longer afraid of the idea of dying. The drugs made him angry undemandingly, so he went out to fight and did his utmost to settle the army leaders. These drugs basically numb them to the violent acts they are about to pursue to make them …show more content…

“I feel as if there is nothing left for me to be alive for. I have no family, it is just me.” (Chapter 18) Family is usually something many people take for granted. Beah along his journey of being a “boy soldier” would’ve wished for his family to be there for him. In hard times family should be there for one another; but not in his case. He was all alone. When his uncle came to take him back to his house to live, Beah was unsure and did not want to believe his uncles identity. His uncle then began crying and Ishmael was assured his uncle was telling the truth. In this case if they had read the whole memoir they would understand losing family would not be cool, nor would they want to experience that

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