Uno in a Nutshell

Uno Ramirez

Makes a living cutting cane
He’s the family bread-winner
He’s only a small boy

Taken from his family
To be a child soldier
Trained to be a killer

Came upon a destroyed village
Found the two survivors
Saved a baby’s life

Had to kill a soldier
Fired the gun but missed
Not a real soldier

Forced to go to war
Ordered to shoot the gun
He killed the other soldiers

It’s not his fault
He had no choice
Now he’s going home

Lolo shot his gun
The enemy shot Lolo
Lolo might never come home

42 revolutions
Fighting a 43rd
None of them solved anything

DAY EIGHT

When I finally fired my gun and killed those men, I became a soldier. Nothing I had ever done compared to what I had gone through in only the past eight days. I finally became a soldier when I learned that war wasn’t about my beliefs, or my values, but what I was ordered to do. It wasn’t about me, or Lolo, or even Capt. Mendez. This was about the revolution. I finally became a soldier when I realized that I would give my life for the revolution and my country. None of this I wanted to do. I didn’t want to kill those men. I don’t want to fight at all. All I want to do is go back to my old life with my family at our village. But now I realize that this might never happen. Now my family might be dead and Lolo could die at any moment. Nothing can ever be the same now. All I can do now is pray that Lolo, Ignacio, and I come through. More than anything else, in the past eight days, what I really learned the most was about myself. A few days ago, I never would have pulled the trigger. Most of my experiences I wouldn’t have been able to handle just a few days ago. Just a few days ago, I was a poor, starving little boy who made a living cutting cane and packing bananas. Now, I am a veteran child soldier of the forty third war.

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DAY SEVEN

When I went in to my first major battle, I knew that this time, I could not miss my target. I knew that this time, if I didn’t kill, I’d BE killed. Unlike the patrol, I knew that this time, there was a good chance that I wouldn’t make it out alive. I knew that the odds were against us due to the fact that we were low on ammo and training. As this was my first battle, I also had no I idea what to prepare for. Whatever there was in store for me, I was not ready for it. I had been training for less than a week and I still couldn’t bring myself to kill anyone. But as I went in to that battle, I remembered the village that I had seen a few days ago and what the Loyalists had done. I remembered all of the destroyed houses and the corpses that were becoming unrecognizable because they were swelling up in the heat. All of those poor people that died and would not be provided a proper burial and who were already being forgotten. With this in mind, I fired. When I killed those people, I though of the families that lost a loved one. I thought of how they might have been drafted like me and might have been against the war. But I followed orders and killed anyway. I knew that what I did was wrong, but there was nothing I could do. But they are in a better place now. Now, I am a true soldier.

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DAY FIVE

That could have been my village, or my family. What the Loyalists did to that village could have just as easily been my village. I can’t imagine what that would have been like for me to look upon my beloved village and see the pointless death and destruction that I saw at that village today. What I saw makes me value life more than ever and it makes me hate the Loyalists with a new found passion. Those people, no matter whose side they were on, were innocent and did not deserve that kind of treatment. For the little girl to have to watch as what she had known all her life: here home, her family, and her life were all brutally destroyed in just an instant was probably far worse than most people will ever experience. To watch as this happened and not be able to stop it will probably haunt her for the rest of her life. I now know how much I would miss my family if they died. The sorrow that came of me when I saw the damage that was done was almost unbearable even though I didn’t even know them. From that baby, I gained a lot of courage. I was teased for having to carry the baby. But I know what I did was right. Not many of those soldiers there would have been able to carry that baby with the teasing that the other soldiers tormented me with. The two poor people that I saved changed my life and I will never forget them. What the Loyalists did fills me with outrage and I can never forgive them for what they did.

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DAY TWO

War doesn’t make sense. Fighting doesn’t solve anything. If it did, we wouldn’t have fought 42 revolutions only to end up fighting one more. Nothing good comes out of these revolutions. Every time a government is overthrown, a new one steps in and promises that life will be perfect from now on. But every time a new government steps in, things just get worse so the fighting happens all over again. The wars tear families apart. My family might already be dead because of this war. If the fighting hasn’t reached my village yet, then they’ll have died of starvation of disease. I was the only one supporting the family and that was hardly enough. Without me, they don’t have a chance. The only ones who are better off with the wars are people like Juan. These people are so blinded by hatred that they do not even see that they are the problem. It is people like him that are causing the fighting. However if they win the war, then there are just people just like them on the other side who fight against them thinking that by winning the war, they can get a better life. But doing this ruins the lives of countless other people. If people really wanted to save their country, they would stop fighting and realize how much the wars have just destroyed the country. In church we were taught that Jesus died to save his people. In the army, they teach us to die to kill our people.

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DAY ONE

I’m in the army now. I feel as if it has been this way my entire life and yet I was only drafted earlier today. I am lost. I know just two people here and they seem to be the only one’s who don’t want to see me dead. However, in a few days, maybe in just a few hours, that’s just what I’ll be to them, just another nobody lost in the war for liberation. But if that is all I am to them, then why am I even here. I’m not very smart. Not like my cousin, Ignacio. I haven’t been to school in a very long time. I can’t. I have to pack bananas and cut cane just to help my family escape starvation. There is no time for school. I could never kill anyone either. They deserve to live just the same as me. I’m useless to them. I’m only another mouth to feed. The food I get here for being a soldier is only starving other people. I don’t deserve this. I’m not even a real soldier. I have already sworn to escape back to my family. At least then, I can earn my food, no matter how little it is. Some of the others here, like Juan, wouldn’t lose any sleep knowing that he’s is the cause of the starvation of others so that he can just kill more innocent people. I can’t stand the though of killing others but I think that by killing Juan, I could save other, more deserving people like my family who no longer have anyone to support them because of this war. We’ve had 42 revolutions now. One more isn’t going to make a difference. What is going to save this country more than any war is peace.

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