Essential Question

I have a new Essential Question,
"How do we help the world? Are we focused on the right problem? Is giving money the solution?"

There is more wrong with the world than poverty. There are things worse than poor people. Things worse than starvation. Things that have been prominent from the dawning of time. As old as Can and Able. Hate. War. Power. Greed. Why can't we give help? Why can't we as Americans share democracy with other countries? Why can't we share our freedoms with other countries of the world? Most don't want it. We'd just be forcing our way of life on other people. Just like Nathan Price. Plus who says we even want to give. Govenments don't want countries to have the same freedoms as we do. Why? Its makes for cheaper goods. More gold, diamonds, cheaper oil. Life is easier for us, we are richer. We could give money to those people in Africa, we could give money to people all over the world. But it seems to be a pattern that money flows to those with power. Those with power only want more power. Power in the form of weapons means death to those who don't have power. Thats most of the people in the world. I am against giving money away blindly. I, unlike singer, would much rather take myself to the problem and help myself. That takes alot more heart. That fills the heart. You have a human interaction. Give money to a corporation, thats all it is, you give money to the corporation. You give money to the kids you see on T.V., who are mostlikely dead when the money gets to them. If indeed the money even gets there. Helping the people in Rwanda, remember that? Or did everyone forget? How many died? Men, women, children. Hate is worse than poverty. We can give all the money in the world, but that didn't erase the age old rivalry and hating of two African tribes, won't help wars.

Here's a youtube video I found. I can't post it because it is very graphic and explicit. But thus is the world. Thus is America.
I don't recomend you watch this if you have a weak stomach. Or if vulgar language offends you.


http://youtube.com/watch?v=0P26mFohLzc

Imagine children younger than you who have to go through life this way everyday. Imagine a 12 year old African kid taken from his family, given an AK-47 and direction to kill anyone that he does not recognize. Imagine the psycological affect that would have on him. Imagine a whole tribe of these kids 20 years after the fact. Where is he now if he's not dead? Hate, and all the things that stem from hate will always be present in the world. Prejudice, Greed, Jealousy. Since the days of Jesus, and before. How do get rid of it. Take a good look at this video. How long ago do you think these tapes were. Obviously not that long ago, the video's in color. I'm guessing in the past 20 years. Imagine the atrocities that are occuring now. Wait until someone posts that on youtube, you can watch it in High Def. Open your eyes to the vast problems in the World and ask yourself. Is charity the answer? Or are we just running around in circles? I agree with Landon's post. The Deliver Me post, I the world doesn't need charity and sympathy, they need help.

Lit. Circle Reflection

During our Lit. circle my group have discussed a number of different things about the current chapter we've been reading about the Poison Wood Bible.

Our first main point was about Nathan Price.
Nathan Price
-selfish
-only wants things done his way
-is very stubborn
-will not listen to others
-believes his way of life is best
-wants others to live life the way he says
-he in a way creates his own bible in his house hold without knowing it
-he physically and emotionally beats his family
-he is inconciderate of his family, especially his wife

The second biggest point we talked about was Orleanna Price.
Orleanna Price
-very submissive, passive
-cannot stand up for herself
-coward
-is very obedient to Nathan
-she has her own ideas she is not able to share
-she is very scared
-she is very unstable
-she is not a good role model for her daughters

These are the two main things we talked about in our first Lit. Circle.

I Live Ewa

The sun shines unforgivingly like the firey eyes of God himself raining balls of fire burning down Sodom and Gomorah. This is Gods country. The bottom of the food chain. Take Fort Weaver road down straight down into the pit of the lake of fire. Countless cars pour into the God foresaken land in the late afternoon, the sun burning their faces as each car slowly inch down through the Weaver. Once you pass all the fake poster town houses in the beggining of the Weaver, once you hit the end of the golf course, you've reached old Ewa, the beach. Home of Crack heads, drug pushers, wanna be gangsters, and people with a dream of one day leaving. The roads are smoothe untill you reach old Ewa. The grass is green untill you reach old Ewa. The Weaver is lined with countless houses. Everyone's crap gets treated here. Don't forget the old nukes left over from World War II. Yea, their in Westlocke, which is somewhere out here in Ewa. My pops knows where they are. He served his country for a little less then 30 years. If Alkaida wants to put a hit on the U.S. No doubt Hawaii will be the first on the chop block. We are a big military base and a smart strategic target. Japan saw that, why wouldn't everyone else. And whose gonna get hit? Why Westlocke, so much nuclear power in those bombs that we in Ewa would be dead and not even know it. All we would hear is the screetch of the bomb slicing through the air like a dead wounded animal, and when it hit we'd be dead instantly. No ones supposed to know about Westlocke and the nukes. And with new technology and rockets, our enemies wouldn't need to do more than just push a button. Just a little secret no one wanted to tell us. If I know, why wouldn't our enemies know. Every mourning the Weaver is lit again with the lights of cars. You have to wake up really early to beat the traffic. The houses here are just that, a place for the working people to rest, eat and leave all over again. It takes an hour to get out of Ewa. And once you get out, everyones heading toward town for work, so you have to deal with another hour or two fighting that traffic. If theres an accident on the Weaver, you might as well turn right around and go home. No one really wants to be here, just that here is easy on the wallet. This is my country. The place I return to everynight to rest my head. A hell of a home.
I go to church right up the road. I wear a ie faikaga to church since it is a church for the Samoan people. The faifeau or reverend, pastor, gives his sermon in Samoan. The sunday school I go to is strictly based on teaching us the gospel in the Samoan language. My teachers and elders don't want us the youth to lose our language. In a way Samoans are like the Congolese. Just we've submitted ourselves to the Lord. We've Americanized our culture. If this is possible I don't know. I feel with the influence of American it's tainted the way of Samoans and our culture. We've shunned our island gods and dieties and accepted Jesus. Mufi Hanneman's father signed the document in Samoa that we would be a Territory of America, where we submissed to God. I still wear a lava lava, pareo, sarong, skirt, at home and around where I live. My father is first generation to Hawaii. We are still live life pretty close to Samoan culture. Its very awkward when my home life gets mixed with my life at school. Life there is very, how do I say, American. I hate when people use part of my culture and language without knowing what the hell it means. That "chee hoo" that alot of locals here say, for example, "Ho brah, cruise parteh tomorrow cuz! CHEE HOO!", stems from my culture. It's called a fa'aumu, and it's has only two functions that I know of. It's used when dancing traditional Samoan dance, and it's during meetings of high chiefs and giving of Ko'ogafine mats, which serve as a type of money. When people do it out in public, at random and not during one of these two, it is very disrespectful. I've gotten a slap or two for doing this.
I live two lives. The one at school and the one at home. Every knows the life I have at school. Everyone at school has the same life. We all walk class to class like brainwashed guinepigs being spoon fed peices of food through a maze of confusion. Some of us find our way though, some us stay in one place, some of us go backwards. Not many people know of my life at home. Not many people care. I don't really care. E le kea a'u.

Literary Circle

Lexicographer

1. Dima- Congolese Lime tree.

2. Dimba- Kikongo word for listen

3. Tata Ndu- Kalinga cheif

4. Nganga- Kikongo priest of traditions.

5. Gree-Grees- African god necklace.

6. kakakaka-

7. Dundu- kind of antelope.

8. Nganga- Kikongo priest such as Tata Kuvudundu. Teaches the sacred african traditions and culture

9.Lenzuka- The poor people and people with bad luck in the village. They all attend Nathan Price’s church as a last resort.

10.Kamikaze deseise- acute viral infection involving the respiratory system; an acute febrile and highly contagious disease.

11.Episcopotamians- different type of missionary. Catholic?

Essential Question pt. 5

"If your afraid now, be afraid, be very afraid."

Heres a newer idea of technology, brought up by Robin Williams. Internal technology, technology implanted into your body. Phones, music, computers. How close are we to this becoming a reality. What human rights will does this violate? Do you want to become part computer. It seems very sifi right now but this concept is very possibly in the future of humanity. Today in English class we talked about our blogs and if they were really better than just writing a paper up on word document. I remember hearing Mrs. Watson say that she is amazed how we, with the html codes and stuff are teaching the computer to show and display us as we want to be displayed and showcased. But how much are we teaching and showing it, so much as it is teaching us and showing us. I mean we have to learn a whole different language in order for the computer to recognize what we want and show what we want, in terms of HTML and stuff. Not to mention learning how to type as well. We learn the computer language, why can't we just speak it it reagular english and have it know what we're talking about? Why do we have to type, why can't it learn to speak english and communicate with us? Why is any of this important? Why do I have so many ideas of how to better my own life? It's human nature. It's greed, it's laziness.

Essential Question pt. 4

Are you serious? Yes, unfortunately here is one of the newest progressions in the clothing industry. Whether this will be come a fad in the future is beyond anything I can conjure up in my mind. But of course anything can happen. Heres the latest fashion in Africa. In America we're putting lights in our clothes. In Africa they're still getting used to the idea of wearing clothes. My essential question again is what do we as human beings value more, Progress or stoping Poverty and Peace. I do not think you can do achieve both at the same speed. If you advance in one, the other will slow up. When I say progress I mean in technology and the highest notch of human living.

Essential Question pt. 3

The new iphone seems like everything a 21st century teenager could want. It's all your basic nesecities in rolled into one phone. It it the epitamy of the article we read in the beggining of the second semester english. The article that was essentially a users manual to some hardcore technological device much like the iphone. Again my essential question is what do we as human beings, or as Americans value more? Progress or peace. I do not need a phone that takes pictures, plays movies and music, can be used as a remote control, is a computer as well as countless other unimaginable roles. But in a way this iphone is just one step closer to the next big advancement in humanity. One day we won't need any of those things. We'll just keep advancing and advancing untill all we have now is obselete to that of future inventions. American companies such as Apple, could use there money to help starving people in Africa, but they don't. Why? No one knows. Could they take a year off from advaning to help give to people in need all around the world, yeah it's possible, but it doesn't happen. Of course if I could make iphones that I probably would not take a day of when there is money to be made, and personally, when stepping back and looking at that fact, I feel pretty bad. It's horrible that this is how I feel but I think this is just human nature. I pray for the "human nature" of future generations.