A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Solider

The serious abuse of Poppay, the supply manager at Benin Home, by the newly admitted residents provides a disturbing view into the baser nature of human behavior under duress. The boys suffer while trying to re-adjust to life outside the military. They still eat their food within 60 seconds as taught in training. Addicted to drugs, angry, and mistrustful, the former child soldiers spend their days fighting each other in endless bloody battles, sometimes resulting in deaths. At night, unable to adjust to sleeping indoors and undergoing drug withdrawal, they drag their mattresses to the courtyard and sit up on them without sleeping until morning. While they eat breakfast, the staff always replaces the mattresses on the boys’ beds to instill a sense of consistency and comfort.

When the mattresses are soaked with rain one day, the residents approach Poppay to demand replacements. He counters that they should wait for the existing mattresses to dry. Feeling disrespected by “a civilian,” the boys stab, beat and kick the older man, leaving him bleeding and unconscious on the floor. The author recalls feeling angry afterwards because he “needed more violence” (140). Upon his return to the center, Poppay forgives the boys, noting that their behavior is not their fault.