Dreary Dreary, Why So Query?

I was writing a paper for Government and stumbled across a video about life under a dictatorship, specifically North Korea, and it really got me thinking about how different and how much better my life is here in the United States. Obviously I knew that I had more rights on than what they might have; I can petition the government, worship who I please, and speak almost as freely as a bird. What I didn’t take into consideration was how big these rights actually were to my life.

In the video, North Korea seems like a different world. It may just be how the documentary is assembled but everything seems dark, dank, and dreary. The oversized streets are peculiarly un-crowded and most everyone is either traveling by foot or by bike. The children are taught that their leader is the “most praiseworthy man on Earth” through overly admiring stories, and singing dreadful songs (to an American eye at least) seems to be a daily occurrence. Individuality is not seen. Even the production of coats is exact to the nearest centimeter on every seam.

I know that there are countries in the world in poverty, and I have heard that many North Koreans were starving, but somehow I didn’t see any of this in the documentary. At a dinner scene, a family was eating a table full of food, with many combinations of the dishes and all of the Koreans shown were obviously not starving in any way.

I guess the most striking thing to me in this video though was how everything was similar, and everyone was equal. I wondered how everything could be THIS similar. I guess I came to the conclusion that because everyone is in fear of being reported, or to really stand out in a bad way, assimilation is a big thing and widely accepted. I guess this is all my opinion and not really based on fact so don’t quote me in a report or anything but if you want to judge it go ahead and watch the video. (345)

A Long Way Gone

                In my world humanities class, we are reading the book A Long Way Gone by Ishmeal Beah. The book is a lot different than previous reads in other Language Arts classes. For one, it is more recent than Shakespeare or Charles Dickens which means that the book obviously contains more recent events. The book is also a lot more graphic and it has detailed descriptions of everything.

                It is about the author’s journey as a child soldier and the wars in Sierra Leone. Beah wrote about his life before the war, before he was a child soldier, when he was a child soldier, and after he was no longer a child soldier. He puts everything in vivid descriptions because that is how he remembered it and didn’t want to put on “rose colored glasses.”

                This book is extra striking to me because of what this twelve year old boy is actually going through. The book portrays scenes that are worse than a horror film more so because they are real. He describes people with intestines falling out, dismembered body parts, gushing blood, and maggot covered bodies. It is not just the descriptions however that make this book so astonishing though, I think that it is the actual journey that this boy takes.

                He lost his family in the first chapter and only has his brother with him and a few friends. They try to find their family instead of running and when the rebels attack the village that they were staying in, he begins to run but it proves to be a lot more difficult than what one might think. It is so difficult that the boys even go back to their village full of rebels to look for food or money to buy food.

                It is one thing trying to survive all on your own, but a whole other thing to be dealing with the graphic images of war and the loss of family members in all of it. (331)

Nepalian Avalanche

                I was reading an article on CNN about an avalanche that hit in Nepal. I heard about the story earlier on the radio and was intrigued to learn more about it. Apparently, the avalanche happened on Manaslu Mountain in Kathmandu, Nepal. As of now, there are eight people confirmed dead but a good possibility that eleven people were killed. The search for the three hikers was suspended this morning.

                The article tells the stories of a few of the survivors and the experience seems like it would be terrifying and absolutely freezing. Arnaud Manel, one of the survivors, said that the avalanche snow started falling on his tent and he managed to get out, only to roll for an estimated 655 feet down the mountain in the snow and figure out he was wearing a t-shirt.

In the video above the article, the man stated that the group had avalanche transceivers on which I assume send out a signal so that people can find you if you are under the snow. What I don’t understand is why they weren’t working and why he wasn’t able to locate the other people that had them on.

Another question that occurred to me was why these people did not get severe frost bite or anything from only having a t-shirt on and going barefoot in the snow. A man that rolled down the mountain in his sleeping bag only lost a few front teeth and suffered an eye injury; the article didn’t even mention a cold-related injury.

I guess though that even though there were possibly 11 deaths, there were still twelve climbers that were only injured after their encounter with the avalanche. If I were them though, or anyone planning to climb up that or another mountain, I would definitely be having second thoughts. (303)

Why You Gotta Be So Mean?

I stumbled across this chart the other day that showed the global government corruptions on a ten point scale with ten being the best, or the most “clean”, and 0 being the worst, or the most “highly corrupt.” When I first looked at the title of it I thought that I would know who would be the most corrupt and the least corrupt out of all of the countries but as looked at the map I was surprised that I didn’t actually guess the country corruption correctly.

                I figured the United States would be the least corrupt and maybe Cuba or North Korea would be the most. It turns out that North Korea was one of the most corrupt countries but Cuba only had a rating of 4.2, so it was pretty corrupt but I mean it only had a ranking of the 61^st most corrupt out of the 182 countries. I was even more surprised by the United States’ ranking. It was ranked 24^th out of 182 and had a ranking of 7.1. I looked more at the countries that were the best on the list like New Zealand, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, and so on, and they do all seem very peaceful and uncorrupt. I started thinking more about the United States’ ranking and was more surprised about how unsurprised I was about the amount of corruptness.


                I guess if you really think about it, politics have been involving more and more corruptness. Politicians need to get elected, and if someone wants it bad enough they seek out investors and political and financial favors. When they are elected they have to pay back those favors or sway a certain way in their voting so that they don’t have to lose any votes in the next election. I honestly don’t believe that a true, good-hearted candidate that does everything that they think is right regardless of public opinion would stand a chance during an election. (326)

North Korea

Http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/11/world/asia/north-korea-is-ready-to-discuss-aid-from-seoul.html?_r=1&ref=world

                The New York Times published an article today that said that North Korea had finally agreed to accept South Korean humanitarian aid in response to the recent flooding and tycoon damage. This is an enormous step for the North Koreans because it suggests future communication and relieved tensions with South Korea. There have been multiple attempts in the past by the South Koreans to offer aid to the North Koreans, but it was ultimately refused because the sum was too small.

                North Korea accepting aid alone is a monumental step, let alone when it is from a country that they have had very high tensions with for many years. I don’t understand how a country like that could let its people suffer. It’s one thing when they are unable to help their people; it’s another thing when they refuse to help their people.

                From what I have learned in school, North Korea spends the majority of its money on its military. When so many people in their country are starving I don’t understand why they wouldn’t take any humanitarian aid. All it the aid is, is free money for their people, so it isn’t like they need to take money out of their budget to accommodate these people, even though they should.

           

            With so many people starving and not getting much help from anyone or their government, it kind of makes me appreciate our welfare and unemployment programs here in the United States. I am sometimes discouraged by it though because so many people abuse it; but if the programs and the money help to keep a lot of people off the street and starving to death, I guess it is a very good thing to have. The amount of welfare we give does actually show if someone were to travel to places like Mexico or the Caribbean in some parts. I have been there and I am always surprised by how many kids are selling things instead of being in school or something. (336)

Attack on the US Embassy

This morning I heard about an attack on the US Embassy in Libya, and also the US Embassy in Cairo on the 11^th anniversary of September 11^th. We discussed the issue again in class and I learned more about the subject. Although our discussion provided me insight, I still had some questions that I needed to investigate further. I wondered if the ambassador was targeted or merely in the wrong place at the wrong time. I was also curious about what that video was about that made it so offensive that it would spark a crime spree. Furthermore, I questioned whether the violence was still occurring in either place or if the violence spread to any other countries.

According to an article on abcnews.com, the ambassador had gone to the consulate when the protests were going on and the attackers were unaware of who he even was. No one had shot him, or bombed him, or targeted him, he simply died from asphyxia from the smoke. Out of the four Americans that died, only two died during the initial attack on the consulate; the other two died in a later attack on a building that was housing the people that fled the consulate.

I also tried looking up the video on YouTube that was supposedly titled “Innocence of Muslims” but by now there are many videos with that name and I am not sure which video was the original. According to the article, the video excerpts “depict the Prophet Muhammad as a fraud, a womanizer and a madman in an overtly ridiculing way, showing him having sex and calling for massacres.” (Michael, Maggie,and Alfitory)

The protests have also spread to other countries but as far as I can tell, none have turned violent. There were protests in Tunisia’s capital and Gaza City, as well as continued protests in Cairo. As long as these protests stay “peaceful” or without violence, I think that they may be a good way to vent out anger. The confusion about the video should be cleared up as soon as possible and hopefully the protests will stop. (381)

Bibliography:

MICHAEL, MAGGIE, and OSAMA ALFITORY Associated Press. "US Ambassador Killed in Consulate Attack in Libya." ABC News. ABC News Network, 12 Sept. 2012. Web. 12 Sept. 2012. <http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/american-killed-libya-protest-film-17215128>. 

Iraq VP Tariq al-Hashemi Sentenced to Death

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-19537301

                This is a news article about Iraq’s vice president. He has been sentenced to death because he and his son have been convicted of running a death squad. His arrest has sparked a “political crisis in Iraq” and Sunni insurgents linked to al-Qaeda have been linked to recent violence in response to the trial. When a warrant was issued for Tariq al-Hashemi’s, the vice president, arrest in December, Hashemi fled. He and his son were found and sentenced to death by hanging on Sunday. Since the US pulled troops out of Iraq last year, violence has been escalating in the country, and on Sunday there were car bombs, raids, bomb explosions, and other attacks. Sunnis are thought to be responsible for the violence. They are angered because they feel like since Hussein, who was a Sunni, came out of office, there has been too much Shia influence in the country.

                I find it appaling that the Iraqi leader was even running a death squad. I think that the United States definitely had a part in choosing the vice president, which means that he shouldn’t behave like the leader that the United States kicked out of office. Honestly, I find the Sunni and Shia fued exhausting. Not so much that they are still feuding, but that the violence has worsened since the United States left Iraq. It seems like the country is just going back to to the state that it was in before the start of the war; which makes it seem that the Iraq war was absolutely pointless. I don’t understand though why the Sunnis are reacting so severely to the sentence of the vice president. I don’t understand the correlation between the two except for maybe the fact that the vice president was acting like Sadam Hussein. (301)

Desperate Indian Mother Who Gave Away Daughters

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-19486173

This is an article from BBC News about a woman from West Bengal, India that sold her children. The mother had three children and was on her own because she left her abusive husband. She was living on a railway station platform when a woman came up to her and asked to have one of her kids. The next day, she gave away her other two daughters. The media in India suggested that she sold them for 185 rupees, or $3.00. The mother didn’t want to give her away but felt like they would have a better living with someone else. The reporter that interviewed her couldn’t believe that the mother could just give her children away like that but the superintendent of a shelter in India wasn’t surprised and said that it happened often with poor or impoverished families. The children however, are usually sold for sex trafficking and are never seen again.

I think that it is really sad that the mother had to give up her children, but I understand why she did. She most likely didn’t have enough food to feed them and didn’t think that they deserved her lifestyle. She only wanted better for them and she thought that they were going to a good home so it was alright. The reporter in the story seemed awestruck at the fact that she could just give up her children, regardless of the circumstances. I understand the disbelief but if I was put in the mother’s shoes, I think that I could see myself giving up my children as well, as long as I knew that they were going to be better off without me. Of course it wouldn’t be easy, but a lot of parents, even in the United States, give their children up for adoption. It just might be different if I knew that they were going into sex trafficking or something like that where they would be harmed. (326)

An Interesting Lists of Interests for an Interesting New Year

It’s a new year with new teachers and the beginning of my new blog year has started. My world humanities teacher this year has asked me to compile a list of my interests that may become a new theme throughout my blogs. Even though they only may interest me now, I assume that my interests can be connected throughout the whole world with all of the different people, activities, religions, etc.

I guess compiling a list of my interests has proven what a broad question that is. I am interested in the normal activities I do, like soccer, running, biking, or swimming, but I definitely don’t want to write about them. My interest in those is in a purely physical form, not mental. I also love to bake but find myself getting yelled at when I write about recipies and my experiences with them...even though I do cite the recipie!

In mental terms, I love travel, but how would you write about travel? I could write about the different places, and their events, but then it turns into world news and I don’t ever read about the world. I could write about the specific ways to travel; for instance by plane, boat, or car, but what would be the interesting part of that?

I guess all of my actual interests though lead back to current events because I love learning about people. I love seeing how people live, how they act, and what they may do for a living. It interests me to learn about different cultures, and beliefs, and why people do the things that they do.

 A lot of thing interest me I guess, it just depends what I want to write about on that day. I wrote a lot of blogs last year about just about everything, but this year I think I might focus in more on current events. (315)