War is not the answer
In Benjamin Zephaniah’s “Refugee Boy” (Bloomsbury Publishing, London, 2001), Ethiopia and Eritrea are at war. Young Alem is welcome in neither place, his father being Ethiopian and his mother being Eritrean. Mr. Kelo brings his son to England to escape persecution. Before leaving, the father exhorts the child to love his neighbours because peace is better than war. The Refugee Council, supporting refugees and asylum seekers, places Alem in a home. Bullied by an elder boy he runs away. But he returns as he has nowhere else to go. He discovers that the other boys have problems of their own. Alem is entrusted to a foster family.
In the Eritrea-Ethiopia conflict, his mother disappears; houses and schools are destroyed. “It is like a family at war, it is like neighbour killing neighbour.” (p 110) The mother will later be found dead. Procedures for obtaining asylum are tiresome and lengthy. In the meantime Alem learns about English customs, schooling, affectionate people, and what it means to be a refugee. Uncertain, lonely and anxious, Alem says to himself, “I would love to see the day when there are no more refugees in the world and the world can live in peace.” (p 262)
Soldiers in a war do not consider whether you are a woman, an elderly, a child, or a teenager. They kill remorselessly. Alem’s father does not want his son to return to Ethiopia. He says, “I have a message for the Eritreans and Ethiopians that are killing each other. Stop it! War is not the answer, only love will conquer. Stop fighting and let us live.” (p 263)
Alem’s father is killed. The police believe the killing could have been done by somebody opposed to peace and reconciliation in the disputed region. Alem is denied asylum at first but things will work out for him. He knows that some people will never approve of refugees but he confesses that “Circumstances beyond my control brought me here, and all that I can do now is pick myself up and try my best to make something out of what is left of my life.” (p 285)
Gas chamber
Bruno, a 9-year-old German, leaves Berlin against his will with his family to settle near a concentration camp in Poland in “The boy in the striped pyjamas” by John Boyle (Transworld Publishers, Penguin Random House, London, 2006). His dad has been made a Commandant. The place appears different and strange. He feels lonely. A barbed-wire fence separates his house and the camp. One day Bruno finds a skinny, sad, shaven-headed boy in striped pyjamas on the other side of the fence. The boy has no shoes or socks; his feet are dirty. Other people are wearing the same striped pyjamas. The boy wears an armband with a star on it.
They become friends. The boy is Shmuel, aged 9. Both share the same birthday. He is Jewish. Soldiers had brought his family here. By coincidence, Bruno finds his friend washing glasses in his kitchen one day. Bruno has been brought here by an officer. Bruno offers the friend food but Lieutenant Kotler thinks the Jew has stolen it. He is severely reprimanded. Scared, Bruno is unable to tell the truth. He is not supposed to have anything to do with Jews. Bruno feels guilty for days. Later he apologizes and Shmuel forgives him as children always do.
Shmuel is worried: he cannot see his father. Bruno promises to help. He is given a striped pyjama in secret. He enters the camp. It is raining. The soldiers are gathering people, about a hundred, for a march. The two children are hidden in the middle. The group is directed towards a long, warm room. Bruno thinks it is to protect them from the rain. Little do they know that it is a gas chamber.
The story is set against the backdrop of the Second World War. Though we do not see the war, it is implicit on every page. We witness how war affects and destroys childhood. The author explains that the novel is about what it means for a child to be thrust into an adult situation far ahead of his or her time. The noble feelings of friendliness and kindness stand in sharp contrast to the ruthless hatred of adults for each other.
The tragic ending makes this novel hauntingly touching. The fence symbolizes division. But the fencing is not high enough to prevent the growing friendship and loyalty between the two innocent boys.
Resilience
In “A long way gone” (Sarah Crichton Books, Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, New York) Ishmael Beah recounts how, at the age of 13, in January 1993, he became a soldier in the army in Sierra Leone to fight the rebels. The latter were attacking civilians, and recruiting children by force. His family was killed. It is a novel with graphic details of brutality. You are not left to imagine anything. You are witnessing live the screaming of men, the wailing of children and the shrieks of women. You see villages on fire and bullet shells covering the ground “like mango leaves in the morning” (p 78). When he remembers the fire, the agonizing voices of children and women come alive in his mind. He cries quietly. How can he ever forget a man being tied to an iron post and his body being set on fire? He wonders, “What kind of liberation movement shoots innocent civilians, children, that little girl?” (p 12)
Later he is caught and trained by the army. The rule is kill or be killed. Killing or slitting the throat is seen as “the fulfilment of some of life’s greatest achievement” (p 133). Killing becomes as easy as drinking water. He is no longer afraid of death. He experiences no remorse. He is often under drugs. Gunshots are as if someone is shooting them inside his brain. He plays mentally all the massacres he has witnessed and he kills more people. He shoots “everything that moved” (p 126). He leaves for war in the middle of a movie and returns hours later after killing and continues watching “as if we had just returned from intermission” (p 132). He has become an automaton.
He sometimes has strange dreams, like he is lying in his blood and a dog is licking it ferociously and baring its teeth. He at times feels as if somebody is after him; his shadow scares him and causes him to run for miles. Even the air seems to want to attack him and break his head. Moreover, he cannot avoid feeling that “the branches of the trees looked as if they were holding hands and bowing their heads in prayer” (p 126). This inability to see his surroundings accurately, and things appearing distorted in shape, could it be the phenomenon of depersonalization-derealisation?
One day, UNICEF will see to it that he and some other child soldiers receive the necessary therapeutic assistance. Ishmael will learn to forgive himself. He will start schooling again. He will also learn that despite the chaos he has been through, children have the resilience to outlive their sufferings, if given the chance.
