Mattru Jong Essays

written by Ishmael Beah on his life. This book was written to show how wars today are fought by children and how traumatizing it can be to a child. The book starts out with Ishmael living in Mogbwemo with his mother and brothers. He then moves to Mattru Jong to live with his father. The war hits when he is on a trip with his friends and his brother to see his grandmother. He then has to run away from the war leaving his family behind him. ishmael continues running from the war for most of his childhood

brother Junior, and Talloi. Ishmael’s group arrived at Mattru Jong, and the day after, school was canceled because their hometown of Mogbwemo was attacked. They returned and left because there was no hope left. They stayed in Mattru Jong until the rebels attacked. After running for hours and only stopping to rest, They tried to go back and gather resources, but almost died because of it. Because of the lack of food, Ishmael’s group returned to Mattru Jong and were caught. They were about to be killed, but

Leonean Civil War. The story begins with Beah, then a twelve year old child, leaving his home village of Mattru Jong to attend a talent show where he and other boys, including his brother Junior, would hip-hop dance to their favorite music genre, rap. On his way he encounters his grandmother’s village where she convinces the boys to stay the night, in the morning he is stunned to learn that Mattru Jong was attacked by the Royal United Front (RUF) and that the people who were in the village were now dead

revolt which takes everything a turn for the worse. The rebels have struck the country with fear and caused complete chaos by killing families and destroying what they once called home. Ishmael, accompanied by close friends, is traveling through Mattru Jong when he firsts hears of the rebels attacking his village Mogbwemo. Once they give up searching for

Title: A Long Way Gone Author: Ishmael Beah Page range: 16 Entry #1: “We must strive to be like the moon” In this quote Ishmael Beah, the narrator, is speaking from Khalilou’s house (Ishmael’s friend) in Mattru Jong. Ishmael and his brother Junior were just returning before the rebels attacked their town, Mogbwemo. This excerpt is significant because his grandmother explained that when the sun rises people are complaining about the heat, but when it starts raining or getting cold they want the sun

A Long Way Gone Response While reading A Long Way Gone, I noticed that family is an important subject throughout the book. In the beginning, Ishmael has a mother, father, older brother named Junior, and a younger brother. Ishmael and Junior were very close. When Junior would come home from school, he would bring Ishmael rap cassettes;they would memorize the lyrics and dance to the beat. Ishmael had a rough relationship with his father because of all the stepmothers who had destroyed it. Ishmael’s

of horror before he is rescued and rehabilitated by UNICEF. He speaks at several international conferences on children and war, including one at the United Nations. He currently lives in New York as of 2015. Musa- Musa is a Mende boy who was in Mattru Jong when the rebel soldiers attacked. Musa and his father were separated from his mother during the attack. Musa's father ordered him to stay where he was until he could return with Musa's mom. As soon as Musa's father returned to the village, the attack

In the memoir, A Long Way Gone written by Ishmael Beah, Ishmael faced the tragic start of war in his home place, Mattru Jong, Sierra Leone on January of 1993. At just the age of twelve his village had been wrecked by rebels who had been going to other villages as well. It was just a normal happy day before everything had occurred. When the news spread, Ishmael, his brother, Junior, and friend, Talliou were at a rap performance. They left in search for money and any family, but everything was gone

A Long Way Gone Book Review A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah is a very powerful memoir that shows his experiences as a child soldier during the civil war in Sierra Leone. His writings show how he went from a regular child living day to day to a violent, bloodthirsty soldier trying to survive. I enjoyed this book because Beah’s writing is honest and blunt, and he’s not afraid to describe the horrible violence and trauma he and his comrades endured as young soldiers. Despite the harsh reality of the

of these brutal, savage killers and then later rehabilitated. In the beginning of the book, young Ishmael, who is about 12 years old at the time, travels to a city called Mattru Jong with his brother, Junior, to participate in a talent show, where they learn that their village was attacked by a rebel group. Soon after, Mattru Jong is attacked

survive as illustrated in the following passage “ We could not find anything substantial to eat. We got hungrier day after day to the point that is our stomachs were hurting and our vision blurred at times. We had no choice but to sneak back into Mattru Jong, along with some people we encountered on the path, to get some money we had left behind so that we could buy food.” [27]. Ishmael buried all his emotions to survive, the author makes this point over and over "In the swamp, we ran past people

events are told in the chapters in chronological order. Each chapter describes a part of Ishmael’s journey during the war. There is not a table of contents or index. The book starts out when Ishmael, his brother, Junior, and his friend Talloi go to Mattru Jong for a talent show. When they arrived there, the rebels attacked. During this time, Ishmael experienced what the war felt like for the first time. Ishmael

around such. In the nonfiction book, A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldiers, Ishmael Beah shares personal accounts of what it was like growing up in a period of violence and separation. Ishmael and his family live in a small village called Mattru Jong. When Ishmael is twelve-years-old, his village is attacked by rebels. In the quickness of the attack, everyone panics in an attempt to flee the area in order to find safety. In this process, however, Ishmael is separated from his parents and tries

called a long way gone written by Ishmael Beah, is about a boy who lives through the deadly civil war in Sierra Leone. At the start of his story, Ishmael was traveling to a town named Mattru Jong, when the war broke out at his home town. Him and six of his friends, one of them being his older brother, all fled Mattru Jong, in attempts to escape the fighting and death. After endless days of going through the motions of walking, searching for food, and running from gunshots, they were all separated; Ishmael

In his book A Long Way Gone, Ishmael Beah retells the very intense and traumatic events of being forced into the Sierra Leone civil war at such a young age. As he wanders through the African wilderness, trying to escape the Rebels, Beah explains old memories of his past to the readers. These memories mostly consist of his family and old adages he was told by them. One of these adages is about the moon, which will act as comfort for Beah as he searches for his family. Another thing that comforts as

Ishmael Beah’s memoir, A Long Way Gone is appropriate for the Sterling High school English IV curriculum because of Beah’s knowledge that reveals real life events that have occurred in Sierra Leone. Also, the memoir makes the reader grateful for the life he or she has today. For instance, Beah illiterates that the rebels have no sympathy for innocent lives and did not care if they lived or died. Specifically, when the rebels captured Beah and his friends and threatened to kill innocent people in

family had to live and survive on their own like Ismael's friends Mohamed, Alhaji, and Mambu. The struggle that orphaned or alone children face is tragic, because when they are alone, they must deal with the loss of family. When the rebels attacked Mattru jong, which is part of Sierra Leone, people fled for their lives, and mothers were separated from their children. When children are orphaned or abandoned, they lose their support system, and a support system is critical in times of difficulty and loss

describes a section of the novel in which Mattru Jong’s inhabitants fled because of the threat of the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) attacking the village at age 13. Almost everyone retreats to a location shielded from harm’s way, except for Khalilou and the group of boys Ishmael befriended himself with, in his home village Mogbwemo. Ishmael vividly describes the uninhibited landscape and its eeriness after the

war his main focus became surviving. He has done so by suppressing his emotions, stealing food and killing multiple people. After Ishmael left the violence at Mattru Jong, the focus of Ishmael’s life became attempting to survive every day. Ishmael quickly learn that to survive, he has to suppress his emotions. After the RUF attacks Mattru Jong, Ishmael becomes detached from his family and friends. Joining up with other children who are on the run too. Even though he likes the company, he remains emotionally

A Long Way Gone Book Review Ishmael Beah is a well-known author of the memoir A Long Way Gone which is about a teen Sierra Leonean boy from a small village of Mattru Jong who went through the terrors of war. The book shows how the civil war happening in Sierra Leone at the time affected the lives of many children and families who had no food, water or hope to live. With the rebels raiding towns disguised as civilians, people lost trust in others, even kids. The people were constantly tortured until