M&M

News updated: Aug. 27, 2010

No.1

Figure 1. Map of Pakistan’s flood area.

There was Pakistan’s worst flooding in 80 years.  The floods began in July 2010 following heavy monsoon rains in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Sindh, lower Punjab and Baluchistan regions of Pakistan. (See figure 1) About a million homes have been destroyed since the flooding began. The United Nations estimated that more than twenty million people are injured or homeless as a result of the flooding. At one point, approximately on fifth of Pakistan’s total land area was underwater due to the flooding. “Floodwaters ravaged hundreds of villages in Pakistan’s main province of Punjab Wednesday, destroying homes, soaking crops, and threatening more lives. Aid workers warned that bloated rivers would soon surge into the country’s south, prompting more evacuations.” (Huffington Post, 2010) (See figure 2) The U.N. is concerned that “aid is not arriving fast enough, while the World Health Organization reported that ten million people were forced to drink unsafe water.” “The Pakistani economy has been harmed by extensive damage to infrastructure and crops. The structural damages are estimated to exceed 4 billion dollars, and wheat crop damages are estimated to be over 500 million dollars.” (Carlotta, 2010)

Devastating floods killed more than 1600 people. More than 17 million Pakistanis have been affected by the monsoon floods that began a month ago. In the past few days, at least 1 million people have been displaced in Pakistan’s Sindh province. Homeless families are drinking unsafe water and because of that “hundreds of thousands of victims have acquired transmittable ailments such as acute watery diarrhea, scabies and respiratory infections.” (Carlotta 2010) It is unclear when displaced Pakistanis will be able to return to their homes. But many will have no house to return to. About 1.2 million homes have been destroyed from the flooding.

In Pakistan, heavy rains have washed away homes, shops, and livelihoods. Many people are stranded with no access to food. Millions in Pakistan need clean water, sanitary food, housing and medical care. I think the solution to Pakistan flooding is to help them. The Pakistanis need us. If we donate, it will help them a lot. Every dollar makes a difference.

Figure 2.

This aerial view shows a flood-hit area of Kot Addu, Pakistan on Wednesday, Aug. 4, 2010. Floodwaters ravaged hundreds of villages in Pakistan’s main province of Punjab, destroying homes, soaking crops, and threatening more lives. Aid workers warned that bloated rivers would soon surge into the country’s south, prompting more evacuations.

Vocabulary words:

Monsoon: rainy season in southern Asia when the southwestern monsoon blows, bringing heavy rains.

Ravage: Something has been damaged so much that it is almost completely destroyed.

Evacuations: the act of removing the contents of something.

Acquire: To get; to gain.

Aliment: Nutriment: a source of materials to nourish the body.

Scabies: Scabies is a very infectious skin disease caused by very small creatures and makes you want to scratch a lot.

Respiratory: The respiratory system’s function is to allow gas exchange through all parts of the body.

Bibliography:

(News)

Gall, By Carlotta. “2010 Pakistan Floods – The New York Times.” Times Topics. The New York Times, 27 Aug. 2010. Web. 29 Aug. 2010. <http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/f/floods/2010_pakistan_floods/index.html>.

(Picture)

[Figure 1]

Map of Pakistan’s Flood Area – Hindustan Times. Digital image. Hindustan Times: Latest Breaking News from India, Cricket, Bollywood, World, Business, Videos. Hindustan Times, 25 Aug. 2010. Web. 29 Aug. 2010. <http://www.hindustantimes.com/pakistan/Map-of-Pakistan-s-flood-area/591971/H1-Article1-591497.aspx>.

[Figure 2]

Pakistan Flood Victims: ‘No Food,’ ‘No Money,’ Would Have Been Better To Die (PHOTOS). Digital image. Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post. Huffington Post. Web. 29 Aug. 2010. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/11/pakistan-flood-victims-no_n_678915.html#s122857>.

This is a story about a man named Eddie and it begins at the end, with Eddie dying in the sun. It might seem strange to start a story with an ending. But all endings are also beginnings.

Eddie is an eighty three year old man who dedicated his life to keep the amusement park safe for its hundreds of guests. After his death, as he reached the heaven, he meets five people every five people he meets are related to Eddie or died because of Eddie. He was unaware of their existence.

As he reaches the heaven, he meets five people and learns about the meaning of his life. For Eddie this includes his army captain, his wife and others with whom he had some significant encounter. Eddie was a good man, who was very good to his family and his wife. He was good to the kids at the park and they liked him.

He learns about the interrelationship of all lives, about sacrifice, the value of love, and a source of joy, for generations of children, etc.

I really wanted to read this book before I read Tuesday with Morrie. When I saw this book standing on the “Good books” shelves in the library I was so surprised, and snapped that book directly. “This is my book!” This story is very similar to his another book called, “Tuesday with Morrie.” This book teaches life lessons and has great morals.

This is my favorite quote from this book.

“Sacrifice,” The Captain said. “You made one. I made one. We all make them. But you were angry over yours. You kept thinking about t what you lost.”

For this Scratch project, we drew coordinate grid by using Scratch. Lastly year we have done similar project with this project. However this project was harder than projects we did until now by using Scratch. We learned new icons and control items during this project, for example, “point in direction_,” ‘turn _degrees’, ’’move_ steps”, etc. We used point in direction_ to make the character to turn and point several directions, for example, if we order point in direction 90, the character point 90 degrees. “Turn_ degrees” makes the character to turn 90 degrees and face that way. The hardest part of this project is to creating the face in the grid. It is hard to place face on the grid. Later I realized that it is easy to make coordinate graph when we use “repeat”, because coordinate graph is repeating. So, when we use repeat it will make you easier and comfortable to use.

If you click green bar with “ERASER”, it will everthing and start drawing the coordinate plane again.

 If you click the “2PM” it will draw a face like this.