Outside Reading # 4

"On the contrary, there was a curious, rather gentleness about the way in which he waited for them to come nearer." (76) When Hazel and the rabbits come to the fields, there are rabbits there. They act differently then they do. They act more confident, and less twitchy. Their behavior created curiosity between the rabbits. I think this shows how differently we act depending on how we are raised and the culture and environment you are in. The rabbits at the new warren were scared of many enemies and were very cautious. These rabbits act more casual and relaxed, while they are bigger and look a little different too. Just like people. Richard Adams is trying to show us how people react to things, in a different point of view like rabbits.

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Outside Reading # 3

"Hopelessness and reluctance are blown away like a fog and the dumb solitude where they crept, a place desolate as a crack in the ground, opens like a rose and stretches to the hills and the sky." (72) Finally after a long journey, filled with misery, stress and fear, after all the hopelessness of ever finding this "place" fiver dreams of, the rabbits rejoice. They have found somewhere to start. Suddenly they are hopeful for change, as they see their dreams become reality right before their eyes. They are more motivated now, after approaching these new fields. They feel safer here than in the open forest with no holes or anything to hide in away from their elil. Reassurance is something everyone needs, to help keep them motivated and keep them on their journey, because they still a while to go.

Outside Reading # 2

The journey the rabbits are taking is adventurous, long, and brave. They don't know where they are going. They don't know when they're there, or if they're going anywhere. All they know is they're following instinct. What rabbits do best. After long journeys, and many dangerous encounters with elil (enemies), they begin to wonder if all this is worth the risk. Many of the rabbits get angry, believing all these long days are for nothing, wondering where they are even going. Hazel encourages them to continue. Not to give up yet, they're almost there. Many times people want to give up, or quit. Hazel really helped encourage the rabbits to continue on, and not to give up. It would all be worth it in the end.

Prefix Story

There once was an octopus named Octy. Octy was the eighth octopus of her mother's octuplets, born eight years ago, in October. Octy loved to sing. Everyday she rode her octocycle to choir practice. Today she was going to preform in her octet. She was very nervous. While they were singing on stage, they were suppose to form an octagon. She was scared she was going to trip. The other octopuses in the octet reassured her that she wouldn't trip. During the performance the octet successfully formed an octagon, eight times! After, all the other octopuses congratulated them and got eight high fives from all the octopuses.

Spontaneous Word Poem

Down marches rain,
On a tart hamster,
who burries his leaf in the dirt.

The sun comes out,
The moon stomps away,
Screaming in terror and fright.

The cow doesn't jump,
Over the Sun,
He laughs and falls to his knees.

Outside Reading #1

"With Fiver beside him, he led the way out of the ditch and down the slope. In less than a minute the little band of rabbits had disappeared into the dim, moonlit night." (Adams 36). This quote leads off on the journey of the rabbits as they leave their home for a long and enduring journey. The rabbits in this novel do a lot of adjusting. A rabbit in its lifetime usually never leaves the warren. And neither did its grandparents or great-grandparents. These rabbits have the courage to follow an instinct, and leave. They discover that home isn't a place, its a feeling, and its just being with your family. "The Threarah waited politely for a few moments and then he said 'Well, now, and what ought we to do about it, I wonder?' 'Go away. All of us. Now. Threarah,sir, we must all go away.'" (Adams 26). Here is an example of someone who knows something bad is coming and tries to warn everyone. They try to evacuate the whole warren but that could never work. I think Adams is using rabbits as the characters to show that even creatures have instincts like us. What happens in our world are affected by our human instincts. And this book would be a lot less interesting if it was about humans.

Poems

So much depends
upon a small chocolate egg
in a crisp gold foil
sweet smell fills the air
peanut butter surprise

So much of spring depends
upon the pounding of the sun
the wind blowing through the leafless trees
flowers blooming
a crisp new beginning

War

In Maplewood on Saturday, people gathered to observe the 6th anniversary of the war in Iraq. They acknowledged the deaths of many soldiers who died, and many people spoke briefly of the past six years. I think if you were personally affected by the war or had some family members killed in the war, it would be hard to attend a ceremony like this one. Its nice how they can make gatherings like this one to pay respect to those who have fought in the war. Many were stressing to support Obama's means to end the war and return our soldiers home.

http://maplewood.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/22/memories-of-war-and-hopes-for-peace/?scp=7&sq=war&st=cse

Introduction / Conclusion

Genocide is any act intended to destroy or harm any ethnic or racial group. Imagine a government intruding, and taking over like in the book, Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe. Instead of the government changing their religion, they try to change ethnicity. Ethnicities can’t be converted. These groups of people are so called “cleansed”, or wiped out. With previous genocides, people were never going to let this happen again. But of course, it has slipped between the fingers of society. The controlling government is causing deaths and other problems to the aid workers and the government in this genocide.

Worldwide the war in Darfur is being ignored or pushed aside, like many genocides in the past. Something has to be done. Many organizations have been made to help fight for Darfur. Be the bigger person, make a difference. Donations can be made, even passing along the word helps. Many are not aware of the horrible actions being held in Darfur, letting them know makes a difference. There are local groups to join, events to attend, many opportunities to help out. With many continuous years of war, its time to put an end to this genocide.

Bollywood

Indian art is considered much different than movies we're used to. They explore more areas of Indian culture, and use less glitz and glam. I like the way certain cultures can express themselves by creating their own movies to show the rest of the world. More cultures should do this. I'm sure that certain countries have documentaries of their culture, or short films, but the Bollywood idea was genius. It really shows a fun way to show of their culture and rituals to others. I also think that Hollywood movies could include more cultural movies. They could make an Indian movie even. It would really show that we have wide cultural horizons.

http://www.indianetzone.com/2/indian_artistic_cinema.htm

Darfur Cause and Effect Map

Global Issue / Darfur

Darfur is a global issue, involving everyone. Even with today's technology, we aren't all aware of what is happening with the genocide in Darfur. This terror all started in 2003 and still continues today. A quarter million civilians have fled from these territories, now faced with diseases, rape, starvation, and death. We can all make a difference to help these people. We can make the world a difference, around the world. It isn't write for all of the genocides to keep repeating themselves, do we never learn? People need to be aware of these actions, so it doesn't happen again, but for the moment we can all help. We can learn about this tragedy, and spread the word. We CAN make a difference.

http://www.thegritsbookclub.com/bookreviews/?p=299

Holidays / Darfur

While many children around the world are celebrating over winter holidays, the children of Darfur are simply wishing to stay alive. Being a child in Darfur is quite scary, with 40 cases of children under 5 reporting having a sexually transmitted disease. All they want for the holidays is to have a better, safer, less dangerous life. With the genocide all around them the children hope that they and their family can get through, and return to normal life. But Santa has forgotten about them...

http://darfurneedsu.blogspot.com/2007/12/no-holiday-for-children-of-darfur.html

Culture

Around the world there are many different kinds of cuisines, for people from different cultures or regions around the world. The reason different parts of the world have different foods or ways of life is because they have to use the resources around them to survive. Different parts of the world have different resources. People of different cultures also have different ways of preparing food. I find it interesting how there are so many ways to prepare food, and how delicious they all taste. Different cultures use different seasonings and different utensils.
http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/cultural/foods/culture.html

I was also interested in when foods were discovered or invented. I found this really neat food time line that list most foods and when they were invented. It goes back to before 100,00 BC from the time of only ice and water. When people slowly discovered new foods, and started experimenting with different foods, new foods were created. This list even goes up to modern day, like today when deep fried lattes and deep fried Coco Cola were invented.
http://www.foodtimeline.org/

Change

I found an interesting text about climate, and all the changes that are occurring. It talked about many of the changes this planet is facing. The climate is such a vital part of our world, many of us take this for granted. Too much burning of fossil fuels, and green house gases are heating our earth surface. Many of us are aware of this, but very few of us tend to be doing anything about this. Luckily the United States has now developed a Climate Policy, to reduce the growth of admissions, and promote climate control technology. The climate is affecting everyone; plants, animals, people, etc. There are so many things we can do, even as little as recycling and picking up after our selves can really make a difference. If we really try, we could make a huge impact on this planet, and change the way our planet is changing for the better.

Hope

I found a poem about hope that I really liked.

Hope by Emily Bronte

Hope was but a timid friend;
She sat without the grated den,
Watching how my fate would tend,
Even as selfish-hearted men.
She was cruel in her fear;
Through the bars, one dreary day,
I looked out to see her there,
And she turned her face away!

Like a false guard, false watch keeping,
Still, in strife, she whispered peace;
She would sing while I was weeping;
If I listened, she would cease.
False she was, and unrelenting;
When my last joys strewed the ground,
Even Sorrow saw, repenting,
Those sad relics scattered round;

Hope, whose whisper would have given
Balm to all my frenzied pain,
Stretched her wings,
and soared to heaven,
Went, and ne'er returned again!

This poem is talking about how hope is timid and whispers, and how it would watch her suffer, and not help her. How selfish hope is. It plays tricks on you, you might think hope is on the way, when times are really getting worse. Hope never comes when you want it to come, but when you don't need it. She is saying how hope would have helped her so much, but instead it left her to fend alone.

http://famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/emily_bronte/poems/4188.html

Thinking Map

Religion

Rastafarian is a fairly new belief, that has only commonly used in the last century. Its main area of practice is in Jamaica. According to Rastafarian belief the only true God is the late Ethiopian emperor Haile Selassie and Ethiopia is the true Zion. Rastafarian's also that white Christians have perverted the script of the bible to conceal the fact that Adam and Eve, and Jesus were black. There rituals include marijuana and reggae music. I think it is really neat how so many people can have different beliefs. There are so many religions out there, i didn't realize how many there were. And how someone can know that and still strongly believe in their religion too, is pretty cool.

http://www.mb-soft.com/believe/txo/rastafar.htm

According to this text, gender is "a costume, a mask, a straitjacket in which men and women dance their unequal dance". Gender is a universal image of our status, based on our world today. Women have had a lower status then man for many years, and according to the bible, men are worth sheikels and women 30. In the same category as racism, sexism follows along. What ever happened to a world of equality? Although a lot has changed now, and women are treated of a higher status, even today women are not treated as equally.

http://www.trinity.edu/~mkearl/gender.html

Thinking Map

it was in color...

Culture

I just thought up of a random culture to research and picked Japan. I found some pretty neat things I didn't know. Paintings, calligraphy, and many arts have been a big part of Japanese culture. Clothing is also a main part with the well known Kimono. Another huge part of the culture is the cuisine. Japan is well known for there cooking all over the world, personally Japanese food is one of my favorite kinds of food, with the famous sushi and terryaki. I think it's neat how differently different parts of the world have evolved, even though we're all so close.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture_of_Japan

Struggle / Difficulty

Right now I am reading a book called "A Time for Dancing" by Davida Wills Hurwin. In this book, Juliana and Samantha are struggling. Juliana is diagnosed with cancer. It is really hard for them because they know they're days are numbered. I haven't gotten far in this book so I don't know what happens, but it made me realize that I take a lot of things in life for granted. I should be more thankful for being healthy and that my friends and family are healthy too. We never know when something horrible or tragic can happen and get in our way of life.

Hurwin, Davida Wills. A Time for Dancing. Little, Brown & Company, Inc. 1995.

Natural Disasters

I found an article on Typhoons in Japan.
A typhoon is a low pressure high wind storm, located in the Northwest Pacific. Also known as hurricanes in the atlantic ocean. Typhoon season is usually May through October. In this article thay commented on how catasrophic typhoons can be. In several cases thousands of people have died. When they come they shut down all transportation and buissness. The typhoon controls the whole society. It made me think of how aware and adaptive humans have to be to survive. If we couldn't adapt to weather or disasters on our planet, humans would be long gone. Many times disasters come at a suprise to humans and we need to be able to react quickly, but mostly we need to prepare for the worst.
http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2117.html

Outside Reading Post

In Melbourne, FL, former firefighter Cindy Economou has been arrested for theft of a mans amputated foot. On September 19th an accident on I-95 south occurred. The medical assistants had to amputate the mans foot in order to remove him from his truck. Economou is charged for taking the mans foot home and putting it in her freezer to use for dog training.

Outside Reading Post

I found an article on the worlds largest book. The book weighs 60 kilograms and and the pages are seven feet wide. Scientist Michael Hawley is the author of the 122 page book about the Asian country Bhutan. Five hundred copies of thus book has been made each costing $10, 000. It is said that if this book were to fall over, it could flatten someone. I wonder why someone would want to make a book so big. It wouldn't be very easy to read, and maybe even difficult to turn pages. A book that big seems strange.

Oustide Reading Post

Professor Wilhelm Von Osten of Germany believed that humanity was greatly underestimating the intelligence of animals, this leaded to some mathematics studies he performed on a cat, a bear and a horse. The cat was indifferent and the bear was hostile but he believed that the horse had some potential. Hans the horse had learned to tap the number of times with his hoof, with the number written on the blackboard. The scientist then taught the horse simple math symbols like addition and multiplication. Soon the horse was providing correct answers to many problems, even square roots. I think this proves that animals can be very smart just like humans can, and they are not just food. I think a lot of people believe animals are worthless.