Kally

http://articles.cnn.com/2010-04-09/world/yemen.child.bride.death_1_yemeni-marriage-child-brides?_s=PM:WORLD

by: Mohammed Jamjoon

Imagine that you’re a girl in Yemen, awaiting the day when your parents wanted to married you off to some stranger because they didn’t want a burden like you. What would you do to escape the beatings and the mistreatments from your husband’s family? A 12- year- old girl was married off to a guy that was twice her age. She was married on March 29, but died three days later. Government official have started to take notice about these actions, and they wanted it to end.

Reading this article made me wonder, why were girls a moral burden to their family? Base on their perspective, girls don’t go to school nor do activities like the other boys. If the family were to give the girls away, who is there to help the family with chores? Didn’t they think that is what a job a girl should do? I can infer that this event have been practiced for a period of time, but why did the government notice it now? ”Although the cause of her death was lack of medical care, the real case was the lack of education in Yemen and the fact that child marriages keep happening,” al-Qureshi said. I do agree with what al- Qureshi has to say because the people who made girls married to men older than them didn’t know the consequences of their actions. If they knew what truly happen to those girls, those girls might be safe. Looking at a different view point, those parents wouldn’t care. They would argue about how their culture was, and how it had been a day to day event to them. What if they don’t change? What would you government DO to make a change, when no one listen?

If I were one of those girls, I would imagine myself being muted. I wouldn’t be able to stand up against my parents because I knew that there is a 1 to 0 percent chance I would be rescued. My parents would yell at me, telling me that they raised me up, and now it’s time for me to repay them by marrying to this old guy. But if I was a government official, I would treat this situation differently. These parents may argue that it’s their culture, but me, as government official wouldn’t allow them to harm my citizens. I would start setting punishments out to let the family realize about children, especially girls need their love and caring as much as the boys does. One law that I would set is “if the girls were still married off to older men, by an arranged married, I would lock their son in jail.” When the parents realize they needed their son back, they wouldn’t do anything else to harm these girls. In conclusion, I learned that not all children were bullied by other people, they’re bullied by their family members, but they were too scared to speak up for themselves.

http://gizmodo.com/5903021/bp-oil-spill-aftermath-eyeless-shrimp-clawless-crabs-and-fish-with-oozing-sores

By: Casey Chan

Deformities of sea creatures. Eyeless shrimps, claw-less crabs, and fish without eye socket. What had happen to them? The BP oil spill in 2010, who spilled oil into the ocean. Scientist did experiments, and found out the later generations of those sea creatures were deformed.  Fishermen have never seen sea creatures that have tumor head. They’re now worry about the chemical that have entered the fish body.

If we were to eat those sea creatures, would our body be effected too? Is there a cure to this situation? I felt frustrated because BP didn’t wanted to admit that their oil effected these sea creatures. They even said it was “as safe now as it was before.” If it is much safer, why wouldn’t they want to take the credit, isn’t it a way to do sales for them? Base on this information, I can infer that they oil is actually deforming the sea creatures. The most obvious information was the people at the BP, because they didn’t want to take the credit, that means that the oil’s chemical is bad.

If my community was spilled with oil, I would try to find a way to filter the oil. It’s better to lessen the oil in the ocean, than leaving it as it is. Everyone love seafood, and these fish are in serious deformities. If we still want to eat them, we need to find a way to cure it.

http://lingro.com/translate/http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/2012/apr/11/dhaka-bangladesh-slum-dwellers-eviction?newsfeed=true

What would you do, if your house was demolish right before your eyes in minutes, and you were forced to live in slums? I would never believe that it would happen to anyone, but it did. People in Bangladeshi, Dhaka are living in slums right now. They don’t have enough food, water, and no bathroom to use. It all happens because the government wanted to make the road wider, so they decided to move the citizen back 10 feet. Islam, who did what was told, moved all his items back to his house 50 feet away. When the bulldozers arrived, it kept charging towards Islam’s house, and destroyed everything he has. Not only his house, but other citizens’ house as well. Now they’ve got no where to go, but wait until the government found a place for them to live.

I was mad at what the government has done. They lied about wanting only 10 extra feet. They stole away peoples’ homes, and now these people were forced to live in slums. Have they ever found a place for these people to live before they decided on destroying peoples’ homes? I don’t understand why they can be the government. They had destroy more than 2,000 people’s homes. How are these people going to live? They don’t even have a home they could go to anymore. Have the government even calculate the cost of the goods? Those goods cost a lot of people’s fortunes, and they needed it for a living. I felt extremely frustrated when a girl was going to take test the next day, but couldn’t because she doesn’t have a proper place to study. What have these people done wrong to let the government demolish their house in minutes, without considering about their lives afterwards? The government are paid by the citizen to make their lives better, not to destroy their homes. They are not qualified to be a country’s government.

Looking at society, and knowing what really happens around me made me very surprised. Everywhere I go, people were talking about peace, and creating good relationship. But what have they done for me to believe in them? They took away people’s home, building weapons to make their country super power. But all of these actions were only acknowledge by the government, not the citizen. They are suffering from what happened throughout the country. They have a choice before, but you, government destroyed their hope. For an example, North Korea. These past years, what have they been doing? They were spending all their money on nuclear weapons instead of letting their children go to school, and be educated. They all suffered in the end. I learned that the world was never what I thought it would be. It’s a dangerous place to be in, but you could gain a lot of knowledge through these experiences.

I wish I was stronger. Strong enough to protect my family from being killed. It happened six years ago when I was only 10 years old. If I have protected them, now, I wouldn’t be living solitary.

Six years ago, on June 6, 2006, my whole family were preparing to attend a party at the Jackson’s mansion. We arrived there at 7 pm, but the mansion’s lights were off. We called the Jackson’s number, but no one answered. Suddenly, the door creaked open, and all of us stared blankly at the emptied house. It has been six years since we last visited this place. The Jackson’s family moved away, but they sent us an invitation yesterday, telling us that they’ve returned. “The mansion looked dusty, deserted, and haunted. What kind of party is this?” I thought. We walked in one by one, and my mom suddenly screamed by the look of a dead body. The door shut behind us tightly, as I tried to run out of the mansion. In the cold, and muted mansion, we heard a man’s voice. “Listen carefully, we are now declaring a game with you. If you are able to kill all of us, you would be free to walk out of this house. But, if you failed to do so, you would ended up like the Jackson. We would give you one minute to hide. When the bell rings, the game begins.”

Only the thought of the Jackson’s death scared everyone, but there’s no time to feel depress. My dad hurried us up the stairs, and loaded up the gun he and Mr. Jackson hid, when they came back after deer hunting.  We each held a knife in case we were caught by one of the men. “By the way, there are 3 of us you need to kill. Take your time, we will enjoy this game with you,” said the man. After he finish speaking, the bell rang. We stayed quietly inside the room, trying not to make a sound. Suddenly, the door was kicked open by one of the men. My dad raise the gun up, and killed the guy. One down, two to go. My dad decided to hide in a different room, so we scrambled down the stairs cautiously. My body froze as I saw a man pointing a gun at us. The bullet flew, and injured my dad’s arm. My dad was quick enough to kill the guy before he could fire his second shot.

“Well, well. You are good at shooting aren’t you? You killed two of my men. Well, this is going to be our last game then. I won’t go easy,” and the line was cut off. The last sentence echoed in my head. We were down at the basement, hiding behind a bunch of carton boxes. I saw him coming in our direction, but I couldn’t open my mouth. Bang! My dad fell down, and knocked himself hard on the ground. He didn’t groan nor move. My dad is dead! What are we going to do? The guy inched closer in our direction. My mom ran out, but was immediately shot dead. He was pointing a gun at my brother now, and I could have taken the chance to kill him, but my body wouldn’t listen. I tried lifting my hand, but it was glued to my body. Blood started flowing down my brother’s head. His whole body crumbled down next to me. I felt like screaming, but I was choked.

I was left alone in the basement. The guy left without taking my life. I cried silently, until the next morning. Policemen started to investigate the area, and I was the only survivor of this tragic game. Being the only survivor doesn’t make me feel proud at all. I have failed to protect my family. Failed to stab the guy in the chest before he could pulled the trigger. This is what I get right? Living solitary, without any more happiness within my family. 

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/04/06/in-south-sudan-girls-are-given-away-to-settle-family-feuds.html

by: Tom Rhodes

If you were one of the girls in South Sudan, who is going to be given to another family to pay for one of your family member’s crime, what do you think of the situation? What would you do? In South Sudan, Girls were given away to pay for one of their family member’s crime. Atia was one of them. She was given away when she was 8. She was forced to married to her new family’s son. When her husband died, she was passes on to another man in the family. She was forced to do chores, and was continuously raped by the men in her new family because they wanted her to produce a child to replace the family’s dead ones.

While reading this, I wanted to know the reason why Atia’s family chose her to pay for their crime? Doesn’t her brother have to take responsibility to what he has done? When you committed a crime, you should go to jail, not giving away a girl from your family to pay back your crime. I was disappointed because no one stepped in to question these actions? Who cares if it’s their culture, these people are violating these girl’s unalienable rights. These girls can make their own decision on what they wanted to do. You men have no rights to control their lives. Did you know that you were making their life a living hell. Even Atia felt like suciding twice.

As the citizen of the world, I felt guilty because I didn’t know what was happening in Sudan. I’m a girl myself, who is care and love by my family members, living a good life, watching TV, and play video games, while these girls in Sudan needed helped from people like me. I always thought that everyone in this world is equal. Men and women are the same, and women aren’t treat as tools anymore. But after reading this article, I felt like I haven’t find all the clues of this world yet, and there are still scary, and mysterious truth behind this world.

Trayvon Martin. A 17- years old boy was shot in the chest by the neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman. This case has became a chaos for the whole world. The world believe that this was an act of racism; they tried their best to support Trayvon Martin, by taking pictures of themselves wearing a hoodie, sold t-shirts that said “I am Trayvon Martin,” as well as hats that were decorated with skittles, and the drink Trayvon Martin bought before he was killed.

Base on the law, George Zimmerman was not guilty by shooting the unarmed Trayvon Martin, but there were still some mystery in the story George Zimmerman told the police. George told that Trayvon went and hit him, and Trayvon even hit George’s head a lot of times. The extraordinary part was, there wasn’t any injury on the back of George’s head. Next, George said that his nose was hit by Trayvon when they were fighting, but the doctor said if it was hit purposefully on the nose, the nose was suppose to swell up, but it didn’t. 911 also found a voice tread of the fight. Owen used “Easy Voice Biometrics,” to identify whether the voice belong to George, but the result turned out to be 48% match. This information was surprising for me because I thought George’s “calling for help voice,” was suppose to match up to more than 50%.

As I was browsing through the website, I found a similar article to Trayvon’s Martin death. Jerrod Miller, a 16- years old African American teen was also shot dead by a white policeman 7 years ago. The article said that Trayvon earned more support  than Jerrod did because of the advanced technology, improving on social media, while Jerrod case was only posted on the newspaper. For an example. Instead of tweeting the address of George Zimmerman’s house, someone tweeted to a couple’s house address. People thought the couple was the killer, so they went in front of their house to protest! To prevent arguments, the couple immediately fled away.

While reading some articles on Trayvon Martin, I wanted to point my finger at George Zimmerman and announce him guilty, but I thought it over. I decide to wait until the police has find enough evidence to declare George’s guiltiness. Up until now, I think different nations still judge each other by their skin color, and there’s a saying. “Don’t judge a book by it’s cover,” so I think we should never judge someone by their skin color. We should learn and understand them better before deciding whether we should make friends with them or not. “I AM TRAYVON MARTIN!!!!”

In this piece of writing, I found that my strength in this writing was to organize my thoughts clearly into each individual paragraphs. I kept my ideas clear in each paragraph, and I made sure not to mix two different ideas together. If I was to start this assignment over, I would focus more on my conventions, since my adviser and myself felt that I need to improve in this certain area.

The first step of every writing is brainstorming ideas. When my teacher was introducing us about this writing, we have brainstormed together as a class. During the last paragraph, I said “… and all the electronic devices we have.” This idea sparked when I was listening to music while writing this letter. I saw everyone in the class have their ipods and their earphone plugged into their ears. It was quite a difficult task for me to come up with these ideas. Throughout this writing, the problems I faced was choosing better word choice. Instead of asking my teacher for help, I used the thesaurus to look for the synonyms of the word I originally wanted to use.

Declaration of Independence

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for students to go our own separate ways from our parents, teachers, and school. Therefore, we wrote our own Declaration of Independence for the whole universe to understand why we should be, and will be, independent and equal to our parents, teachers, and school.

We think that it’s obvious that we’re all created equal and are endowed by God to the rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of whatever decision we make. To achieve these rights, parents, teachers, and school should permit students to make whatever choices they wish. However, when parents, teachers, and the school begin long term abuses and usurpation against students, that shows they only want to control every aspect of our lives, it is our responsibility, our duty, to take away the control parents, teachers, and the school has over us, and to authorize our independence.

All of us students have been keeping all this mistreatment to ourselves, but with continuous abuses and injustice by parents, teachers, and the school toward us, we have no choice but to expose these secrets to the whole universe. The school has provided us with atrocious food choices. Teachers have assigned us too much homework with insufficient amount of time to finish. Our morning break ends right when our second block starts, and my parents don’t allow me to hangout with my friends.

We have explained this issue to our parents, teachers, and the school, but our petitions have been ignored. We have used grades to persuade them. Moreover, we have even prostrated ourselves before your ruling throne, but you have spurned us. We are now breaking our blood tie with you. We, students denounce you, and we will be enemies in school, and friends at peace.

We, therefore, the representative of the student body present these facts to the whole universe. Our, fellow students have united in our ideas, including the Supreme Judge who has acknowledged it. Now, we declare that we should be free and independent, equal to all of you. For the support of our declaration, we pledge to each other our lives, our sacred honor, and all the electronic devices we have.

We must fight!
We must fight for our freedom.
We are not weak
But the war has actually begun!

We must fight!
Forget about the delusive phantom of hope.
Don’t deceived ourselves,
They will turned us into beasts.

We must fight!
Our supplications have been disregarded
We even prostrated ourselves before the throne
But we have been spurned.

We must fight!
There is no longer hope.
If we wish to be free,
We must fight!

By: Will Vanlue

Had a deck of card

We played black jack together

It was addicting

Arrived at host’s house

Met her two little daughters

I slept on the floor

Adorable dragon

Trying to play basketball

The dragon spoke Laos

Washing jet black hair

Hard to dry the owner’s hair

Since she broke her arm

An important game

Running up and down the court

But we lost the game

Last dinner with host

Ate yummy and spicy foods

Enjoyed it a lot

Street glittered with lights

Walked down the welcoming road

Owners were smiling

Last day in Vietiane

Went on the bus to airport

Last glance at this place