Ishmael has accept the fact that the war has ruined his enjoyment of meeting new people. Because of him going into villages and being chased out because they believed he was a rebel, Or having to go through other villages because he knew nobody there and he knew what was coming to their village and he did not want to stay had ruined the experience for him until later on in his life. Ishmael's experiences force him to deny his emotional side in order to survive. His flight from RUF attacks on the various villages in Sierra Leone requires him to let go of attachments to family and friends. Although he holds out hope to see his family, he has no choice but to close off himself to the world. Emotional attachment can be weakness, and weakness can …show more content…
Ultimately, there is a disconnect from reality when the addiction takes hold. Without the drugs, as in Benin Home, Ishmael becomes aggressive and the boys resort to raiding the hospital to quell their hunger. When the drugs begin to wear off, Ishmael's headaches return - as do images of slaughter. Violent movies, like the drugs, help to create a surreal, dreamlike atmosphere for the boy soldiers. They would often go on attacks in the middle of films like Rambo or Commando, sometimes acting out techniques seen in the movies on the battlefield, and then pick up where they left off when returning to base. The reality of war bleeds into the fiction of war films, which helps to further disconnect the soldiers from the truth of situation. Ishmael's almost cinematic nightmares feel like a product of this conditioning and only through rehabilitation is he able to confront and discuss his wartime actions. When he is being trained, Ishmael learns to channel his rage and seek vengeance for his family. Though he had spent months suppressing his emotions for the sake of survival, Lieutenant Jabati and his men encourage Ishmael and the boys to tap into the fear and anguish in order to
Her unquestionable allegiance was crucial in giving Hitler and the Nazis power and helping them in their conquests for dominance. Thus, she was a victim of brainwashing and a factor that led to the continuation of many horrors. Likewise, in A Long Way Down," after joining the army, Ishmael was brained into fighting as a boy soldier. At the military camp, he was "always either at the front lines, watching a war movie, or doing drugs. There was no time to be alone or to
Ishmael was given drugs like cocaine, cannabis, and methamphetamines as an adolescent. The Army got Ismael hooked on drugs:” He handed them to each of us with a cup of water. “The corporal said it will boost your energy” (116) ALWG. The Army gave Ishmael drugs to manipulate him by making him dependent on these drugs. Ishmael was forced, to kill other young men like him by the army: “The corporal gave the signal with a pistol shot and I grabbed the man's head and slit his throat in one fluid motion” (125) ALWG.
Now, as for Ishmael’s headaches and nightmares, I think it is PTSD. He went through so much as a 12-year-old, and it’s not fair. He keeps getting his hopes up, only to be destroyed. A 12-year-old should not have to worry about if they are going to survive, or if they are going to be captured, or if they are going to get killed. When the rebels surrounded the village and Ishmael had to join the fight to stay alive, I felt like crying.
As Ishmael Beah becomes accustomed to the cruel life during war in Sierra Leone, Ishmael learns that ensuring trust within the companions he meets on the battlefield keeps him “human” throughout the duration of the war against the rebels, as is displayed in A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah. After Ishmael and his brother, Junior escape from a village Junior whispers quietly, “I do not think that this madness will last ... he looked at me as if to assure me that we would soon go home” (Beah 15).
He no longer feels as if he has control of his future. Right now he is compelled to do anything possible to survive. Like most children Ishmael is afraid to run away, he decides to join the army. When Ishmael first started off in the war as a solider he felt traumatized, disgusted, and horrified by his experiences. On page 100 Ishmael encounters several dead bodies, it was such a traumatizing experience for him; he felt like he was going to throw up.
Some of these ways are loss of self control and impulsiveness which both relate to Ishmael, because he had no feelings self-control and impulsiveness because he had no consideration of what could happen to him during the war or what he was doing to other people. The text says “Drugs are chemicals because of their chemical structures, can affect the body in many different ways. Some drugs can even change a person's body and brain in ways that last long after the person has stopped taking drugs”. This quote is important because it proves how drugs change and it tells the affects people. Now I will show how Ishmael was traumatised.
“Example” Lillian 2 The effects of the war were apparent in the boys, both physically and emotionally traumatized by the events that changed their lives. Ishmael states that he began to feel nothing: “Nothing happened in my head. It was void” The battle that occurred that day left him
Ishmael has a flashback of his life in the war. In his dream he encounters a body wrapped in white bed sheets, and as he unwraps it he realizes it is his own face he is looking at. He then awakens, sweating and on the ground. He says, “I was afraid to fall asleep, but staying awake also brought back painful memories” (Beah 19). Even being in a different country cannot take away the hell that Ishmael has been through.
The human condition is full of paradoxes and double meanings. We can commit the most shocking and terrible acts, but we can complete the most virtuous and honorable feats. Ishmael Beah describes the appalling and violent behavior he and other children exhibited toward the human life during his time in the Sierra Leonean civil war in his memoir, A Long Way Gone. Beah also details the forgiveness and kindness of complete strangers that helped him become the man that fate meant him to be. Homo sapiens are complex creatures brimming with irony and surprises.
(1991-2002) Ishmael’s story solely focused on the years he was affected by the war. (1992-1997) The tale begins when with Beah, his brother, and a couple of his friends, heading to another village to put on a performance and while away, they catch wind that their village had been attacked by the RUF (Revolutionary United Front). The boys' having no home to go back to, wander from village to village looking for shelter and safety.
What is the meaning of adversity? Adversity is the difficulties, misfortunes, and sometimes even trials one must face in order to jump over an obstacle. WWll, holocaust, Racism are all adversities that pertain to individuals and events in the past and the present. One of the events that happened was in Sierra Leone and it was a Civil war between different African tribes. This event is explained through the eyes of the main character in the book “A Long Way Gone”, and his name is Ishmael Beah.
Memories “Memory is a way of holding onto the things you love, the things you are, the things you never want to lose”(Arnold). In the book a long way gone a boy named Ishmael beah tells his story. In this novel Ishmael’s village is eventually raided and he becomes on his own. Through being on his own he thinks of the past and memories of a better life. These memories that he thinks of can hinder him and help him along the way through his journey.
At the age of 13 till the age of 16 the author, Ishmael Beah, pulls himself through many terrible conflicts in Sierra Leone. The author uses conflict to show his readers the realism of his story. By using conflict in many different ways, it allows readers to gain an understanding of how Ishmael struggles changed his life for worse and for better. By using person vs person, person vs society, person vs self, and person vs nature conflict the author is opening doors allowing readers to get a full understanding of Ishmael 's challenges of a life in war. The most commonly seen conflict in ‘A Long Way Gone’ is person vs society.
Later, UNICEF came and decided to take Ishmael out of the war and put him in a rehabilitation center. In this part of the novel, the reader can see how his desire for killing has controlled him completely. By fighting and killing rebel members in the rehabilitation center and beating up the guards to force them into doing what the children wants to do, the reader can see that the war has changed their ways of life and thoughts. The army was able to change Ishmael 's desires and from that, he became a deadly
The way Beah explained what happened to him, he did it in a sad way. My response to the writer is that I feel sorry for him. I cannot relate to him in any way since I have never been exposed to war and even been a soldier fighting in it. He was strong through the hardest part of his life; the actual war itself, rehabilitation, and ultimately escaping Freetown, Sierra Leone to eventually fly over to New York and start a new life. Ishmael Beah’s memoir, A Long Way Gone, replays a part of Beah’s life that will always be very vivid to him.