‘A Long Way Gone’ by Ishmael Beah was the main point of discussion in class today. It’s a narrative of the authors’ account of his time as a boy soldier in Sierra Leone during the civil war. At just 12 years old, he was kidnapped after he lost his family and the book follows his story through drugs, murder and his increasing desensitization of the situation he was living in. A few crewmembers have been reading it on board and led the rest of us in what it was about and what their own thoughts on it were. 

They mentioned that its not a political book, as I would have expected, it doesn’t go into the political situation of the time or place because to the boy soldiers that wasn’t what was important; to them it was about staying alive and seeing the next day. Also the fact that they were surprised that it wasn’t about good vs. evil; everyone was out for everyone apart from themselves and were all as bad as each other. Kent read a passage, which involved the author’s own description of looking into the eyes of the man he was about to kill. It was graphic and shocking but really described what they had to go through nearly everyday. Ishmael’s traumatic experiences as a child must have deeply affected him but apparently in the book, guilt is not something noticeable outright, due to the driven nature of his influenced upbringing. Kent seemed genuinely moved by the powerful writing and from just the small extract he read, I wanted to read more myself. I had heard about boy soldiers before and vaguely knew of their existence but never heard any of their own voices or stories. Ben pointed out that this book is describing what is still going on today and is still a current issue that needs to be seriously addressed. The man speaking in the book lived to tell his incredible tale but many do not. >From this short class and discussion today, I really do want to read the book and to know more about this topic to try and see what is being and can be done.
 

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