Ishmael Beah is a man with a remarkable life story. His childhood was stolen by a vicious civil war during the 1990s in the west African country of Sierra Leone that forced him to join in the fighting in order to survive.

After recovering from his early life as a child soldier, he is now an ambassador for UNICEF and a New York Times best-selling author.

On Wednesday, Beah will come to Souhegan High School to share his experiences with a group of students who may find it hard to believe the tragedy, violence and conflict that Beah will surely describe. Every word, however, is true and every account is to be trusted, because this man lived every moment of it.

Souhegan faculty and students have been busy preparing for Beah's long-awaited arrival. Library assistant Marjorie Hobbs, who organized Beah's visit, recently led the book group in reading Beah's best-selling memoir, "A Long Way Gone."

"All nine of us in book group have read Ishmael's book," junior Carly Christensen said. "I loved it. It was a touching, but at the same time upsetting, story that I think all students should hear."  The Ethics Forum, a group of upperclassmen who raise money throughout the year, has decided to focus its efforts on raising money to pay for the shipping of 22,000 books to schools in Sierra Leone. One of the schools that will benefit from the books was built by Beah with the profits made from his memoir.

On Jan. 13, Alusine Kamara prepped junior world studies classes on the history of Sierra Leone and what life was like for child soldiers such as Beah. Kamara was one of many adults who risked his life directing the rehabilitation home in Sierra Leone that helped Beah and other child soldiers return to society.

Now living in Massachusetts, Kamara speaks alongside Beah about the troubled past of Sierra Leone and the current urgency to help this country rebuild.

Acknowledging a group of Souhegan students, Kamara said, "This is the foundation of the world. There is no place on Earth where kids are not the foundation."

Kamara described the challenges he faced as he tried to rehabilitate children who had seen nothing but war.

"You like this person, you want to help this person, but they hate you," Kamara said. "When they have a gun, they have power. We brought them down to the center and asked them to be kids again."

After many heard the powerful words of Ka
mara and read Beah's compelling memoir, the anticipation for their talk greatly increased. Many students realize what an honor it is to have these men come to speak and how vital it is that we listen.

"It's so important because Ishmael experienced firsthand a tragedy that people in the U.S. are very uneducated about," junior Molly Mirhashem said. "It's important that we take something away from his story."

Kristin Leffler is a junior at Souhegan High School in Amherst

Ishmael Beah shared his story
with students and community members
at Souhegan High School.

Ishmael Beah spoke at Souhegan High School on March 25, hiding the horrors of his past with a bright smile and calm demeanor.

It was hard to believe that this optimistic man had been dragged into a vicious civil war in Africa when he was just 13 years old. Beah was born in 1980 in the small, poverty-stricken country of Sierra Leone.

"Being a kid before the war is one of the things that I still miss," Beah said. "The simplicity of things was absolutely remarkable."

The war in 1992, however, stripped life of simplicity and left Beah vulnerably wandering the country. With seemingly no other choice, he found himself fighting in the civil war, joining more than a quarter-million defenseless child soldiers.

Child soldiers were ultimately brainwashed to kill by devious authoritative figures who exposed them to extremely powerful and addictive drugs and influential war movies.

"They called us 'the lost generation,' " Beah said, explaining the label that the media gave child soldiers. They thought, "Once you were touched by violence, that was it."

However, hope wasn't completely lost, said Alusine Kamara, who joined Beah on stage at Souhegan. Kamara was the director of the rehabilitation center that Beah attended fresh out of the war.

"They can command anyone to do anything for them," Kamara said. "To tell them to be children again was not pleasant for them."

Beah and the other child soldiers struggled in the center with drug withdrawals, unshakable memories of war and a dependence on violence as a solution.

"I wasn't a good kid at all," Beah said, and he later thanked Kamara and people like him for their dedication. They had the "strength to see our humanity when we couldn't see it ourselves."

With 300,000 child soldiers still fighting in conflicts around the globe, Beah is now working with UNICEF to help rehabilitate child soldiers and to prevent future unethical use of children as a war device.

The adults who pulled children into war "specifically targeted children," Beah said. ". . . Anywhere where human rights are violated, people should be held responsible."

Beah's memoir, "A Long Way Gone," gives a detailed account of his life as a child soldier.

"I needed to write this book to put a human face to the experience," Beah said. "All of us are capable of losing humanity with the circumstances, but are capable of regaining it, more importantly."

Beah built a school in his home country through Schools For Salone, an organization dedicated to building schools in Sierra Leone to get the country and its future on stable ground.

"With education," Beah said, "people are able to find a new direction in their lives."

Beah is a man with a past that would have discouraged most, but his strength to find a new direction led him to a life that he's grateful for.

"I appreciate what it means to be alive," he said. "Just waking up in the morning in peace - it's why I'm always smiling."

Kristin Leffler is a junior at Souhegan High School in Amherst.