Kelsey Castillo's Digital Journal
38364
February 12, 2016
In the story A Long Way Gone, Ishmael's father quotes, "If you are alive, there is hope for a better day and something good to happen. If there is nothing good to happen. If there is nothing good left in the destiny of a person, he or she will die." His father is trying to explain to Ishmael that with out hope your piratically dead. Hope is what keeps you going and doesn't let you give up. Ishmael explained that his fathers words "becamethe vehicle that drove [his] spirit forward and made it stay alive."
February 15, 2016
Ishmael escaped death in many different situations. One of the well known escapes was when Ishmael, his brother Jr, and his friends were saved by a young man from their village. At first the chief didn't not believe that they were all from Mattru Jong, so he called a boy who had come originally from the same village and asked him if he knew them. Fortunately, the group had their own band and would perform in random areas in Mattru Jong. The young boy recognized all of them by name and to be honest no one in the band had recognized him but they thankfully "warmly smiled" at him. Another situation that they all encountered was when they were caught by rebels and taken into a village where there was several other who had been captured. They had to observe the evil rebels torture and tease a poor old man whom seemed to be in his 60's. Afterwards the rebels led the group of people into the forest were suddenly they were getting attacked and they all ran for safety and soon the rebels left and Ishmael and his friends had to wait for hours for the clear that the rebels were gone. Unfortunately, these examples of how Ishmael escaped death are only two of many.