11-12

Chapter 11-12
Literature


Chapter 11 starts with the boys coming up to the village where there parents are. As they come up on the outskirts of the village, the meet a man from Ishmaels’ old village. His name was Gasemu, and he was very highly respected in his village. He asks the boys to help him take some bananas back to the village with him, and they agree. He is pleased to see them and says there parents will be very happy to see them. However, when they get close to the village, they hear gunshots and people screaming. Then they see smoke coming up from the village. They run for cover, and watch as the village goes up in flames. When the gunfire ceased and they thought it was clear, they started making there way out when Ishmael ran to the village. He wanted to see if anybody made it alive. Unfortunately, no one did, and when Gasemu told him which house his family was in, Ishmael went in, and saw piles of ash. Ismael started attacking Gasmu for holding them up, but then ran out of energy and could no longer do it. Soon after, some rebels came, and they had to hide and wait for them to leave. The rebels seemed happy they had killed so many and ruined so many lives. They were giving each other high fives and boasting about what they had done. A couple hours later the boys and Gasemu decided it was time to leave, and they made a run for it. They ran into the forest and ran for hours. They stopped only when the rebels had given up, the it was reveled that Gasemu had been shot. He started to cry, and then when he was close to dyeing told them about the village ahead, and told them where to go. They carried him to a point, then had to leave him. They came up to an army checkpoint, where they were taken by a soldier in a boat to the next village.
Chapter 12 is about there indoctrination into the army. The chapter starts with them having a good time in the village. They were helping out with whatever needed to be done, and where getting shelter in return. Then the war reached the village, and the army started sending out troops. Fewer and fewer troops would return from each sortie with the rebels, until eventually the lieutenant had to recruit any able bodied man and boy to fight for him. The boys decided to fight, and soon training began. They went through drills of marching, standing at attention, and physical training. Then they stated to learn to do all of this with an AK-47 in hand. They started learning how to shoot and how to bayonet someone. But one of the things that made sense to me if you were going to train these boys as soldiers was when the drill leader said imagine the target you are shooting or bayoneting is the rebel who killed your family. The boys became furious, and were very aggressive when thrusting the bayonet or shooting a target. The chapter ends with them preparing for battle.