I found this clip on CollegeHumor.com and thought it would be SO funny if one of the guys that came to our class had been more like this. I would have chose him.
http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1804409
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
My 9/11 2001
That morning I had planned on dressing up in a 70's style tight collared shirt, bandanna, and huge sunglasses (Ridiculous Freshman year, yet surprisingly popular now... I was so ahead of my time, as I have ALWAYS been) So anyway, I went up to my mother's room where she was up and getting ready for work. For some reason, even though I never normally would, I turned on the TV at the foot of her bed and saw the first images of the World Trade Center with smoke pouring from a hole in the side of each building.
My initial reaction was that it was some sort of building fire, I was quite astute for my age. I watched the news for about five minutes before heading downstairs to walk to the bust stop, still dressed like an Elton John fan-boy. I remember telling the other kids at the stop what I'd seen, they'd say what they'd seen and for the first hour since it happened I treated it somewhat lightly. It was hard to understand then what implications this day would have for our country.
At school the teachers let us watch the news in every class for about ten minutes before continuing with the regularly scheduled lessons. This gave the day an almost fun quality, the teachers were allowing us to watch TV for Christ sake, how cool is that? I'm not sure if the other kids were feeling the same, but from what I could tell no one understood yet that this was a time for serious reflection.
Perhaps the worst thing about that day for me came in my last class of the day--Math. The images were looping yet again on the news, as if it had just happened moments ago, everyone was watching while discussing what they'd seen. Throughout the day I had never actually seen the footage of the planes directly hitting the buildings, only the burning fires and then inevitable crumbling of both towers. That being said I was more than a little anxious to actually see what I had never seen before which was a passenger airplane smashing full force into the side of a Skyscraper. Looking back, as I have many many times, I feel so deeply ashamed as to what happened next, but at the time it didn't seem shameful at all. As I said we were in our last class of the day and everyone else had already seen the said clip except me, so as we sat there staring at the screen and the clip of a Jet flying into the side of the second tower finally surfaced for me, I literally stood up and yelled "YES!" while pumping my fist in the air. My classmates just stared at me, some laughed, but I'll never forget the look on my teacher's face. I didn't understand what his look meant then, I couldn't have, but thinking about it now puts me in "heavy boots."
I've never actually recounted this story to anyone before but what better place to reveal the most shameful moment in your life than on the World Wide Web.
My initial reaction was that it was some sort of building fire, I was quite astute for my age. I watched the news for about five minutes before heading downstairs to walk to the bust stop, still dressed like an Elton John fan-boy. I remember telling the other kids at the stop what I'd seen, they'd say what they'd seen and for the first hour since it happened I treated it somewhat lightly. It was hard to understand then what implications this day would have for our country.
At school the teachers let us watch the news in every class for about ten minutes before continuing with the regularly scheduled lessons. This gave the day an almost fun quality, the teachers were allowing us to watch TV for Christ sake, how cool is that? I'm not sure if the other kids were feeling the same, but from what I could tell no one understood yet that this was a time for serious reflection.
Perhaps the worst thing about that day for me came in my last class of the day--Math. The images were looping yet again on the news, as if it had just happened moments ago, everyone was watching while discussing what they'd seen. Throughout the day I had never actually seen the footage of the planes directly hitting the buildings, only the burning fires and then inevitable crumbling of both towers. That being said I was more than a little anxious to actually see what I had never seen before which was a passenger airplane smashing full force into the side of a Skyscraper. Looking back, as I have many many times, I feel so deeply ashamed as to what happened next, but at the time it didn't seem shameful at all. As I said we were in our last class of the day and everyone else had already seen the said clip except me, so as we sat there staring at the screen and the clip of a Jet flying into the side of the second tower finally surfaced for me, I literally stood up and yelled "YES!" while pumping my fist in the air. My classmates just stared at me, some laughed, but I'll never forget the look on my teacher's face. I didn't understand what his look meant then, I couldn't have, but thinking about it now puts me in "heavy boots."
I've never actually recounted this story to anyone before but what better place to reveal the most shameful moment in your life than on the World Wide Web.
Monday, February 18, 2008
Persepolis
Having never read a graphic novel before I was completely enthralled by this work, leading me to consider being more adventurous with my future reading. To be honest, I haven't ever really taken the time to determine whether or not the "Graphic Novel" was truly a part of the literary world that I felt needed exploring; this was wrong of me.
I loved the way this book is presented to the reader. Taking such a powerful time in a country's history and displaying it in cartoon frames with a young girl, no less, as the main character really struck me. I never found the pictures to be distracting, and often found them to be excellently concise in their portrayal of broad concepts like dream conversations with God, and protesting various regime changes in the city. Each picture told a little bit of the story that the dialog leaves unmentioned, such as scenery or physical descriptions of many characters, as well as adding to what is said in the word bubble.
To me a memoir discussing a childhood in a turbulent country during one of it's most turbulent times needs a lighthearted edge which is brought forth brilliantly through the child-like drawings. While the subject matter is morbid and frightening at times, you are still reminded that this is the life and times of a little girl. I loved the juxtaposition of total political chaos, and a child rebelling through any means possible, be it with music, clothing or otherwise. It really humanizes a part of history which could be glossed over in today's media as simply "Political upheaval in The Middle East."
All in all I found this novel to be an eye-opener for me in terms of how I will find new work to read in the future. No longer will I limit myself to the run-of-the-mill paperback, "Be adventurous" I"ll say to myself in the book store, buy a comic book!
I loved the way this book is presented to the reader. Taking such a powerful time in a country's history and displaying it in cartoon frames with a young girl, no less, as the main character really struck me. I never found the pictures to be distracting, and often found them to be excellently concise in their portrayal of broad concepts like dream conversations with God, and protesting various regime changes in the city. Each picture told a little bit of the story that the dialog leaves unmentioned, such as scenery or physical descriptions of many characters, as well as adding to what is said in the word bubble.
To me a memoir discussing a childhood in a turbulent country during one of it's most turbulent times needs a lighthearted edge which is brought forth brilliantly through the child-like drawings. While the subject matter is morbid and frightening at times, you are still reminded that this is the life and times of a little girl. I loved the juxtaposition of total political chaos, and a child rebelling through any means possible, be it with music, clothing or otherwise. It really humanizes a part of history which could be glossed over in today's media as simply "Political upheaval in The Middle East."
All in all I found this novel to be an eye-opener for me in terms of how I will find new work to read in the future. No longer will I limit myself to the run-of-the-mill paperback, "Be adventurous" I"ll say to myself in the book store, buy a comic book!
Monday, February 11, 2008
Poetic Post
My poetry from Friday's class was not actually the same poem in three different "moods" but rather three different poems all together.
The steps below the building fall in gentle succession of four to five at a time, slowed down to pools of gray rectangular stones between like a slow moving creek. wider it grows as it nears the base of the slope, opening up to the black asphalt of the stony estuary.
We build our walls with the bodies of our own virulent young. "Keep out terrorists!" we say, only to pile more death and putrid suffering to the top of our fear. Blood oozes slowly down the glistening face, one more hero-- an invader from the land of milk and hypocrisy.
To know happiness is to know love. A brick in a quarry, a drop in an ocean, you and me-- in a world so full.
I am no poet.
The steps below the building fall in gentle succession of four to five at a time, slowed down to pools of gray rectangular stones between like a slow moving creek. wider it grows as it nears the base of the slope, opening up to the black asphalt of the stony estuary.
We build our walls with the bodies of our own virulent young. "Keep out terrorists!" we say, only to pile more death and putrid suffering to the top of our fear. Blood oozes slowly down the glistening face, one more hero-- an invader from the land of milk and hypocrisy.
To know happiness is to know love. A brick in a quarry, a drop in an ocean, you and me-- in a world so full.
I am no poet.
Sunday, February 3, 2008
Interesting Preponderances, this day, the Super Bowl
My question for the children of Hailsham is this:
If you know that you're going to be an organ donor who will live a stunted life of hospital visits and recovery, why not escape to another country?
This may sound much like the questions posed by classmates except that I'm wondering whether this thought crossed the minds of the students after leaving Hailsham, once they are on their own and can fend for themselves in some sense. Another question which bothered me was where the money was coming from to support the students while they were in the Cottages, as they did not seem to have any real responsibility other than keeping themselves alive and well read.
I understand the question of why they would not escape to another country would probably seem a ridiculous idea to most Hailsham students because they've always been resigned to their own fate, but it seemed to me once they were allowed a little more freedom and the opportunity to travel around England, they would also want to travel abroad, and perhaps stay there.
The question of where the money came from is dealt with somewhat near the end of the story while Kathy and Tommy discuss "Deferrals" with Miss Emily but I began to wonder whether or not they would receive enough funding to basically raise however many children were at the school to adulthood. This brought up another question for me, is it truly pheasable to raise a human being all the way to adulthood just to harvest the few organs you can while they're donating? It would almost seem easier to just develop a way to grow individual organs, rather than entire human beings.
I have to say that upon finishing this book I was quite satisfied with the ending, and the loose ties that came together to form a solid story with plenty of interesting commentaries on life as we know it, and the possibility of life in the future.
If you know that you're going to be an organ donor who will live a stunted life of hospital visits and recovery, why not escape to another country?
This may sound much like the questions posed by classmates except that I'm wondering whether this thought crossed the minds of the students after leaving Hailsham, once they are on their own and can fend for themselves in some sense. Another question which bothered me was where the money was coming from to support the students while they were in the Cottages, as they did not seem to have any real responsibility other than keeping themselves alive and well read.
I understand the question of why they would not escape to another country would probably seem a ridiculous idea to most Hailsham students because they've always been resigned to their own fate, but it seemed to me once they were allowed a little more freedom and the opportunity to travel around England, they would also want to travel abroad, and perhaps stay there.
The question of where the money came from is dealt with somewhat near the end of the story while Kathy and Tommy discuss "Deferrals" with Miss Emily but I began to wonder whether or not they would receive enough funding to basically raise however many children were at the school to adulthood. This brought up another question for me, is it truly pheasable to raise a human being all the way to adulthood just to harvest the few organs you can while they're donating? It would almost seem easier to just develop a way to grow individual organs, rather than entire human beings.
I have to say that upon finishing this book I was quite satisfied with the ending, and the loose ties that came together to form a solid story with plenty of interesting commentaries on life as we know it, and the possibility of life in the future.
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