SPELLBOUND

Should we still have spelling bees? Why? Why not?

When it comes to spelling bees my position is neutral. I believe that participating and preparing in a spelling bee has positive and negative effects. When you inscribe in a spelling bee you are submitting yourself into a long process that has various rounds of competition. If you want to get far in the competition you have to study a humungous quantity of words, now this will take up a big amount of your time. Having little time left makes it very hard to have a social life , and even if you had time many societies specially the one in the United States doesn't include "nerds" much, well at least that is what many people consider the participants of spelling bees. But on another side the positive outcomes of participating are that you don't get involved in things like drugs , gangs , alcohol and other unhealthy things. You also develop more academically and expand your knowledge. When you go to the contests you can become friend of other participants that are just like you and that will give you a social life that is more suitable for you.

Allowing spelling bees to continue have good opportunities just as I had mentioned before, but also has its down side. The state gives children a chance to participate but it is their choice if they give up their social life and possibly stress from the pressure that is placed on them. But it also gives them a chance to participate in a group of few people who share the same interests.

Choose one subject (person). Describe how winning the spelling bee is important to that subject.

Neil , a indian child from Sanclemente, California was probably the one with most pressure to win the competition. He studied 8,000 words daily and had various tutors for the different languages. His parents where very demanding on this subject and pressured him a lot to do his best. His grandfather hired various people to pray for him and offers to feed a few thousand people in india if he won the spelling bee, so he had the pressure from his family. It was important to him so that he didn't disappoint his familly.

ETHOS, PATHOS , LOGOS

This advertisement is ethos because it is promoting a brand (Nike) by using a characters credibility (Serena williams).

This advertisement is pathos because it appeals to our feelings in order to help a cause (help Haiti).

This advertisement is logos because it uses facts and reasons for people to do what the add indicates ( stop smoking).

Malala Yousafzai

As I read this article I was shocked that there was still a country that was in the midst of a religious and ethical war. I thought that as technology advanced people would begin to become more modern and more tolerant to different religious and ethical beliefs. But this girl opened my eyes to a whole new idea of Pakistan, a country that is in one of its worst moments and that is reflected on society. Malala shows us the reality of being a teenager in pakistan and is not afraid to do so. She wrote under an anonymous name but that still didn't keep her safe and now she is in the hospital in recovery , but the consequences could have been much worse.

In the article they show a passage from her diary  On my way from school to home I heard a man saying 'I will kill you'. I hastened my pace... to my utter relief he was talking on his mobile and must have been threatening someone else over the phone." This shows us that she didn't get very alarmed but she did take precaution and walked faster. This demonstrates to us that to threaten someone with killing them is very common , and i can relate that this to the years 2000 in colombia when drug lords would have people kidnapped, killed , etc.

I want to thank Malala for risking her life to show the world what is happening in her country and I believe that she has a great future.

The Passport

Even though the book says that this was a while ago many countries still close their borders during wars nowadays. And many times civil wars start since people want to leave the countries for safety reasons or other personal reasons , sometimes they even have to escape.

When they mention that the little girls uncle dies because of a grenade I start to think that maybe he was so shocked and stressed that any little thing would make him have a heart attack and that was why the grenade killed him even if it didn't explode. they also state that his son was take to be a soldier at a very young age. You can see this in colombia and many other countries with terrorists groups like the guerrilla who take children with little resources and convert them into guerrilleros.

The Sheep

I can relate to this personally since I feel that when the little girl tries to participate in a adult conversation they make what she says useless. To be more specific she told the adults what she had heard on television , and her father reacted in a way that disapproved her comment since it stated something that he didn't agree with. Sometimes when I talk with my parents I feel that way because I don't know much about the topic, but when i try to participate with a comment that i believe is use full it is just ignore by them.

Persepolis

I once read in a book about the holocaust that during the wars they would take away the man of the family. This reminds me to the part in this chapter where many children's fathers are taken away for prisoners. In the book it mentions that the mother or woman is forced to make uniforms for the nazis.

Another thing I can relate this chapter to is a movie I watched that talks about a man who goes out hunting and leaves his daughter at home, but he never comes back because he was kidnaped. So that could have been a possible outcome from the situation that the main character faces when her father does not come back.

The Veil

Capitalism : an economic system that is based on private ownership, and the creations of goods and services for profit.

Decadence : it is used to describe decline because of a moral or ethical tradition.

Veil : a piece of clothing that is used to cover the face, mostly used by women.

Prophet : a man that has been chosen by God to be his messenger.

Demonstration : a political protest.


Questions :
Why does the main character skip 2500 years and is still alive ?
What are her parents protesting against ?

XI

During Gilgamesh's journey he starts to wonder how a man can become immortal and tries to find out a way to do so , on the way he met Upnapishtim who is the god of floods, he starts to tell Gilgamesh the story about how there is a flood and he has to build an arc and put two of each animal in it. and how after the flood he finds land. Gilgamesh then asks how he can become immortal and he sends him on some quests , one is not to sleep for a week but when he is about to begin he falls into a deep sleep, Upnapishtim tells his wife to bake bread every day until Gilgamesh wakes up so that there is proof that he was asleep since he would deny it, Gilgamesh woke up on the seventh day. This story is like the story of Noah's arc because he builds a boat (arc) to ave all the animal species from a flood, he is then honored for saving the animals and human kind.

VIII - X

This section in Gilgamesh I understood a lot that since Enkidu was dead he had a lot of questions and wanted answers even if it was a very dangerous or long journey to find those answers. He starts to think about how a human can be immortal or be a god , on his journey he meets a lot of people that try to help him find answers. A movie similar to this is Hercules he is a god but doesn't know. Once he finds out he initiates a journey to find out where he belongs and what his purpose in life is. So for being the first text ever written (Gilgamesh) they have the same theme or morale as some moved from now a days.

I believe that when we die we go to heaven, that is only if we have been good. Heaven to me is a place where the soul goes after death, there we meet with other people and loved ones who have passed away and we join them there. I think these pictures represent heaven in different ways. The first shows how we reunite people in heaven, the second one shows that it is a superior place that there is a light at the end of the tunnel(the tunnel being death) and the third shows that it is beautiful even though no one knows how it truly is.

VI- VII

I can relate to this section because I think that the bull that was sent by the goddess is a problem, so if you treat it in a good way with respect and wisdom nothing bad will happen, but if you treat it in a negative, disrespectfully or you harm it you will have karma. So when Gilgamesh killed the bull that the goddess sent out of revenge, he got more karma which later on ended up affecting two people, Gilgamesh himself and Enkidu, Because the goddess got mad and killed Enkidu because Gilgamesh was gifted. When Enkidu dies, Gilgamesh feels a terrible greif and pain which leads to a time of sorrow. So I believe that if you get karma you can also affect someone close to you in a way.

IV- V

What do the dreams that Gilgamesh has represent in the story ?
How does Enkidu know what they mean ?
How could the smell of the demon be death but the forest be so pretty and alive ?
Why did both Gilgamesh and Enkidu hide but one first and then the other ?
Why does the demon surrender at the end of the battle ?

I- III

At the begining the story reminds me of two movies, the beauty and the beast and the little mermaid because in the movie the beauty and the beast the beast is tamed by bella a woman who by kissing him turns him into a prince. And then the little mermaid gives up her tail to get legs and become human so that she can marry the prince. So that relates to the palace prostitute taming the man of the wild.

There is another movie that I saw and relates to another event, the movie is called "Big Mike".  It is a movie about a homeless kid who is adopted into a wealthy family and protects the children from danger, I think that this is exactly what happens in Gilgamesh. Because Gilgamesh's mother adopts Enkidu so that he can battle the dangers until it is time to fight the demon.

I can infer that:  
1. She is celebrating her birthday because there are cupcakes and she is blowing out the candles

2. She is at the beach because of the way she is dressed , and I can see a andy surface

3. The people around her are having a good time because of their body language and their effort into the place.