A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah



gccblogs.concernusa.org 

28 comments:

  1. What are the rebels fighting for? Freedom from the government? To take over the country? They must have a reason for walking around and shooting everything.

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    1. Maybe, the rebels want to feel more independent. There are so many issues in African countries. Those rebels are often very unhappy with their actual life because the leaders of the countries are very wealthy and most of their population poor. Those rebels are mostly "normal people" that got angry about their situation. They want a political change to get better conditions. It is hard for the government to change conditions and establish work places because of the mostly extremely dry environment (especially North - West Africa). Rebels got even stronger because they get support from Western countries with interests in resources.

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    2. I think it was something along the lines of taking over the country according to the information on this website. The groups manifesto is, "committed to peace, by any means necessary, but ... not committed to ... becoming victims of peace," http://www.start.umd.edu/start/data_collections/tops/terrorist_organization_profile.asp?id=4247#

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    3. They want to get rid of their government just for the sol fact of the amount of corruption in their government.

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    4. I guess the rebels are fighting for the power over the government, but not over the whole country.

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    5. I believe they arr fighting to take over the country in my opinion

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    6. I think the rebels are fighting to take over the whole country

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  2. Are the rebels from a specific village or tribe or did random groups just start fighting?

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    1. I think the rebels are from all over the country. They fight against different groups. It is mostly their own government. They want to live in better conditions or they are just unhappy with their political leaders. In the 21th century, those rebellious actions are getting even worse because of different types of media and how you access media (Internet, Smartphone, etc.). There are special groups who fight against other groups but mostly innocent people get involved.

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    2. I believe the rebels started with a bigger organization outside of africa and than got tribes to by in and then they started to attack other villages

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  3. What can we do to prevent teenagers to get a soldier? What can we do on ourselves from so far away?

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    1. We can donate money to organizations such as UNICEF that help children all over the world. In fact, UNICEF is the organization that helped Ishmael get free.

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  4. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  5. Why did the rebels attack the imam in the mosque and burn him alive?

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    1. He refused to tell the rebels what parts of forest the people of the village were hiding in.

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    2. Also, instead of just killing him, they burned him publically to show the significance of not doing what they say. It obviously got the point across to Ishmael's friends and Ishmael himself.

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    3. To prove that they will do anything to gain power and fear

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    4. He refused to give up precious information about where the villagers are

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  6. How many other kids have wrote books about there pasts as a child soldier ? and if i spelled anything wrong correct me lol #yolo

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    1. *written* I'm sure many people have experienced the same things as Ishmael however not written about it and have it gained so much attention as him.

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    2. Child Soldier: Fighting for My Life is a book describing a child that fights to stay alive in a war he shouldn't be in. link: http://www.amazon.com/Child-Soldier-Fighting-For-Life/dp/1919931198

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    3. There are a few books that are similar to A Long way gone such as They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky: The Story of Three Lost Boys from Sudan by Benjamin Ajak. Also the following books in this link: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/143819.They_Poured_Fire_on_Us_From_the_Sky

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    4. Other children that have miraculously survived the war might be illiterate or do not want to remember the hardship they faced. You can tell its hard enough for Ishmael, and were only through the beginning of the book.

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    5. There are a lot of books from people who were child soldiers in the past. Those books show people the situation to people all over the world. They are made to share their experience and give people the impulse to do something against the child soldiers. Here are a few interesting books: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1/181-3741313-5305235?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=child%20soldiers&sprefix=child+soldiers%2Caps&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3Achild%20soldiers

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  7. I think it is strange that allegedly, the army is so strongly stationed at Bonthe than anywhere in Sierra Leone. You would think that the rebels would have invaded the islands too. Do you really think it's safe in bonthe?

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    1. The reason is most likely because the rebels aren't interested in Bonthe. the rebels fight for blood diamonds, and the mines are in the southeast and the markets are in the northwest, Bonthe is in the South. Blood Diamonds are what fuel the rebels, so they would centralize around areas that have to do with the mining or selling of them.

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  8. What's the role of children-soldier? Is it their desire to be soldiers?

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  9. Why did ishmeal leave the protected village? It was guarded regularly!

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