Hi! My name is Leonidas, and I come from the Greek state of Sparta. My life has been very interesting, as most Spartan lives are. Let me tell you a little bit about it.

I was born the first of a set of twins. My brother was too weak, and a man carried him to a nearby gorge to be left to die. This was done to all of the weak babies. My mother doesn't like to talk about that, so I won't go into it.

I had a good childhood until I was 7 years old. That's when I was removed from my home and organized into a small band of boys my age. I was lucky enough to be made a captain, which meant I was one of the most courageous boys in the band. While I was at that military school, I slept on a bed of rushes in a dorm. For food, we ate black broth and other coarse food. One time, a boy in my group caught a fox and hid it under his shirt, so that our leaders wouldn't catch him doing this sort of thing. He was stopped on the way into the dorm, and he let the fox eat a hole into his stomach before he would let the leaders find out the wrong that he had done. We wore simple clothing, nothing fancy at all. In school, we were taught toughness, discipline, endurance of severe pain, and survival skills. Surrendering and retreating in battle was cowardly and disgraceful.

At 20 years old, I became a soldier. I went to live in a barrack, and I was able to eat meals with my fellow soldiers, and also to marry. I couldn't live with my wife, though. I had to live in the barracks for a while longer. The soldiers are forbidden to own gold or silver, and our money consisted of iron bars. War songs were our only music, and our education was terrible. We never learned how to do all the things that the Athenians knew how to do.

At age 30, I became an "equal" to everyone else. I was allowed to live with my wife for the first time in my life, and I lived in my own house. I was still in the military, though. I stayed in the military until I was 60 years old.

Now that I'm retired, I can look back and tell you how our life was and how it is now. We lead a life of discipline, self-denial, and simplicity. We don't have expensive foods, luxuries, or leisure activities. This is the key to understanding us. The Athenians think we are insane, but really, we are simple people who believe in military strength. Most of us deal with our life, and some of us even like it. Moral values and human courage and strength are greater than anything to us Spartans. That's the way it's always been, and that's the way it will be until I die.