[VVP/Teen] Meeting Ishmael Beah
Today, Sam, Nafiza, and I went to meet the author of the a memoir A Long Way Gone, Ishmael Beah. It was a conversation between Beah and Tom Brokaw, a journalist. Tom Brokaw was asking questions about Ishmael's experience of being a child soldier, and how did he get out of it. The audience also got the chance to ask questions during the conversation. After the conversation, Nafiza and I lined up to wait for Ishmael to sign on my copy of A Long Way Gone. Fortunately, Nafiza got chance to ask for advice from him on something that he thinks should be in our film. However, he didn't really answer our question. He said it's going to depend on us. Despite the disappointment of his answer, it was a great time to be there to meet him and to hear about his experience. He is a very nice and gentle person, and humorous too. One thing that I like lot about what he was saying is that many people in this country are always looking for more, and not caring about what they've have already, but in contrast, people who live in Sierra Leone, they are happy about what they have; even though what they have are very little. A lot of time, I felt the same way. In my school, we are so lucky that to have so many new books and laptops each year, and yet, I still heard people complaining. Sometimes, I saw books were being ripped and drawn on. I felt very angry about that, I was thinking all these kids need a lesson, they need to learn to appreciate things happen and given in their life. Kids here who own so many things like Ipod, cell phones, computer, PSP, Xbox, all these things are extremely lucky! We are living in haven comparing to kids who live in a third world country. I think every single thing in this world that is given to us deserves our appreciation.
Maybe, I'm kind of off topic, it should be child soldier, but any way, another thing that I remember he talked about was about trust. It took him 8 months to heal, and start to trusting people again. I also remember that he wrote in the book about the normal civilians, how they were not trusting people because of the war. People stop trusting people including little kids, since the tragedy of the war begins. It all because of the child soldiers, the sharpest weapon of both union army and rebels. The entire community collapsed. People were running around with blood on them, rivers dried up because of too much blood flooding. People avoiding or capturing kids who wandered around. All kids without their families are suspicious. What a traumatic situation! The war killed people mentally and physically at the same time. Their weapon was the only thing that they can trust. They completed relied on their AK-47. They either kill or be killed. In order to survive in their world, the only way is to have other people bleeding and die. It is a hell comparing to the "peace" here and other countries. Aren't we living in the same world? Isn't the land that we live on spinning with the same globe around the sun? People, comparing to the distance between earth and sun, the tragedies are much much closer to us! Why is there no voice about what had happen at the beginning of everything? If only everybody shared some part of their love, and cared, the world would be much more beautiful. Maybe the world is really sick, and the problem is we can't find the right doctor for it.
