Journal 6- Austin

        I think that Beah's friend Junior has meant the most to me in this book. In the beginning when their village was raided, the boys looked at Junior as a leader and he lead them to safety and mimicked his actions and movements. They boys also looked to him as a big brother figure "I slipped and fell,spilling the water. Junior gave me his bucket,took my empty one, and returned to the river. When he came home, the first thing he did was ask me if I was hurt from falling. I told him I was fine, but he examined my knees and elbows anyway, and when he was done, he tickled me."(Beah 39) This part in the book shows how much Junior cared about the boys without saying anything. When he saw that  Beah had fell, he instantly gave him his bucket and went back to the river. Upon Juniors arrival, he made sure Ishmael's knee's and elbow's were not hut, but then proceeded to tickle him. This tells me no matter what happens Junior wants a smile on the boys faces.

     I believe with Ishmael's rehabilitation that with enough work with professional doctors and therapists and groups that he will be able to put it all in his past and be a full functioning member of his community. I would want him to move into my neighborhood. I would be skeptical of it at first, but after he was around the community for a few months and showed he wants to better himself he would be just another person. On the other hand if anything ever happen like a natural disaster or a civil war, Beah has been through all of it before and he would know what to do, or have a better chance at survival than someone who has never been in that situation.

     Their are an un-countable amount of lessons you can learn from just this one book. The part that stood out to me though was when Ishmael was going to America and no one believed him, everyone always told him to not get his hopes up. An example of this would be when he is discussing this with his uncle and his uncle says "Don't let them get your hopes up, young man." (Beah 191)To me this means more then just crushing his hopes. This says that his uncle and his family have been taught or learned to never expect anything good to happen to you, so when something good does happen it is an extremely special occasion. But on the other side when something bad happens they just take it with a grain of salt and keep going with their lives.

 
   Something I would like to learn more about are child soldiers and their role in the war as a whole. In Beahs book it was focused around child soldiers and what he did. I know that their are thousands of child soldiers and that most to all of them are taken by force and brainwashed and told what to do, how to do it and when. Without any remorse the adult soldiers send the kids to die day after day.