Ishmael Beah's Presentation

During this week we were required to go and see the presentation of Ishmael Beah on his novel: A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Solider. I found his presentation to be very enlightening by way of a lot of the things that he had to say which had a more meaning coming from his perspective. Even though the entire book was written from his perspective, seeing him in person brought a new element to the experience of his novel. I can’t speak for anyone else when I say this, but I assume for a lot of us students this made what we read in the book even more of a reality, because there he stood in our Emens auditorium talking about his experiences. Out of the various things I enjoyed about his presentation, I’d say his words of encouragement were inspirational. For instance when he spoke about school, he mentioned that no matter the reason in which we are at college currently, he wanted us to view our education as a way to help to help others less fortunate (no matter where our talents lie) as well as learning our place in the world which is tied in with what it takes to be human. Or at least that’s what I took from what he said, but everyone may have there our interpretation. There were many other saying and/or implications with what he said that I thoroughly enjoyed listening to and I really liked his presentation.