blog 15: overcoming the odds

For this weeks blog I ended up reviewing this book I just finished for the second time. I absolutely love Jodi Picoult books and have read numerous of them. This book, My Sisters Keeper, is one my favorites and it always gets to me. I have two other sisters in my family which I am very close with so it is easy for me to relate to this book. The book is about one of the sisters, Kate, who has leukemia and the other is basically in the same position and her name is Anna. Anna does not have leukemia or any other sickness, but she might as well be called that. She has gone through numerous surgeries, transfusions, and shots for her older sister’s leukemia. This book goes through many obvious experiences about overcoming the odds. I will not share how it ends but you can obviously see the Anna has to overcome the odds every day. She could completely not agree to any of the surgeries and just live a normal life. Instead, she chooses to sick with it for the sake of her sister.

blog 14: TWILIGHT

Love is any of a number of  emotions and experiences related to a sense of strong attachment and feelings. When you love someone you get that certain feeling that all you want to do is be with them or talk to them. Last night the movie Twilight came out on dvd and I watched it with my sister. Everyone, even if they have read the book or not, is familiar with the story, Bella Swan is in love with Edward Cullen. The twist of the story is that Edward is a vampire! Their relationship is changed by that factor in many ways. First, Bella wants to become a vampire now that he is. Second, the two get in many problems with other vampires because Bella is a “human.” Although it is hard for the couple to remain together because of those reasons and the fact that they do shows real love.

blog 13: WAR

For this week’s blog I read an article on war but not the kind of war with guns. When you hear the word “war” you think of the army and the guns that they use but people never think of cancer as a war. My grandma had skin cancer when I was twelve and even watching her go through that was a war in itself. For the person who has cancer it is the biggest war of your life. When I saw this article I though it would have been the perfect one to do for this subject. This man in the article got a tumor right in his lymph nodes (right by your throat). The doctors had told him that the usual way to get rid of this serious disease was to completely take out the entire larynx or the voice box. The man was absolutely terrified of this but instead he made it out and in recovery by going through lots of chemotherapy and radiation. It is kind of funny to see how far technology has come from 1989 because in the article they say that this was very advanced and back twenty or so years the only way of survival would have been to take out the voice box. In the year now of 2009 scientists are trying to come up with ways to get rid of this was called cancer all together!

Rosenthal, Elisabeth. “The Cancer War: A Major Advance.” New York Times. 8 October 1989. 15 March 2009. <http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=health&res=950DE7DA123EF93BA35753C1A96F948260&scp=5&sq=cancer%20wars&st=cse>. 

blog 12: colonization

For this week’s blog I found an article that was very interesting to me and very informational. A little bit ago our school had an informational talk about genocide in Darfur. From this assembly it really enlightened me about what is really going on in our world today and that everything isn’t always sugar coated. This article talks about the Hamidiya camp in Sudan and talked to many of the boys/young men there in the camp. They said that they came there when they were teenagers and have grown up in this camp because of colonization. I feel like this is completely wrong and I wish there was something more that we, as a nation, could do! It also says in the article that these people are really worried about their education. For me I go to school everyday whining and wishing I could be in bed, when these people want an education so badly and would do anything to be in my position. It honestly makes me feel like I don’t appreciate anything that I have.

MacFarquhar, Neil. “Angry Youths Become a Force in Darfur.” New York Times. 20 December 2008. 11 March 2009. <http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/21/world/africa/21darfur.html?scp=2&sq=colonization&st=nyt.>.

blog 11: global issue

For this week’s article I read an article about a famine in Africa. The article was telling us about the famine in Africa and how people were barely living through it. What happened was that the food costs went up very rapidly and then the live stock that people were DEPENDING on started to die because of heat and starvation. This all happened because the people of Africa couldn’t buy any food for their animals either! It was a continuous cycle that kept going and it was sad because there was nothing we could do about it. WE all know how bad the economy is right now but back when this was going on imagine it being ten times worse before the prices shot up and heat is on your back twenty four seven. I think that this situation is horrible! It makes me so sad to see this happen to innocent people. It said in the article that children and adults were chewing their own lips or tongues because they were so hungry.

Gettleman, Jeffrey. "Famine Looms as Wars Rend Horn of Africa". New York Times. 17 May 2008. 8 March 2009. <http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/17/world/africa/17somalia.html?_r=1>.

blog 10: the holidays

For this week’s blog I read an article about the holidays and how the economy affected them this year. As everyone clearly knows, the United States is in some trouble financially and the economy is very bad right now. The holiday season starts up right around Thanksgiving and ends with new years. From the food to the presents there is obviously a lot of money to spend to celebrate the traditional holidays. The lack of the economy this year changed it for everyone. Some people had no money to spend on the gift exchanges and homemade comfort food. It was sad to see so many people not able to have a good time just because of a financial crisis. I know in my household my family didn’t spend as much money on gifts this year as we have in the past. This saving of the money affects the businesses as well! In the article they talk about all the cut backs people had to make this year such as things like donations to a church! I think this is really bad news for us and hopefully things will get better. All I know is that we dug ourselves deep into this hole and we will have to get back out of it someway. 

Hoffman, Jan. “No Job and Fewer Gifts.” New York Times. 28 November 2008. 3 March 2009. < http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/30/fashion/30laidoff.html?scp=10&sq=the%20holidays%20&st=cse>

blog 9: BOLLYWOOD

For this week’s blog I read an article about Bollywood with a twist on it. In the article it talks about how Snoop Dogg was going to be in one of India’s upcoming movies. The Bollywood movie “Singh is Kinng” was eager to have Snoop Dogg in it and the title song was already becoming popular in India. Snoop Dogg said that he really enjoyed the Bollywood movies because they had so much music and dances in them. He was so excited to mix the Indian bhangra with his hip hop style.  Karan Wadhera, the co-founder of Cashmere Asia, a new Los Angeles-Mumbai entertainment company was the one who hired Snoop Dogg to come over to India to perform. He wanted to find out more ways to introduce hip hop to India. He also said that in many of the Bollywood movies they have been trying to incorporate hip hop dance moves into their dances!

Timmons, Heather. "India's New Partnership: Bollywood and Hip hop." New York Times. 28 July 2008. 3 March 2009. <http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/28/business/media/28snoop.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=bollywood&st=cse>