“Why have I survived the war? Why was I the last person in my immediate family to be alive”? (p. 179). What does Ishmael learn by asking these “Job”-like questions?
I think Beah uses these questions to understand the bigger picture of things. He can see the forces that made him into the person he had become. He was a scared, scared, resilient, and damaged young man. These questions help Beah understand he was a pawn in a cycle of power and greed that gripped his country. He was a pawn that, at times, did the right things to stay alive. Staying alive also meant having immense psychological damage.
