Reflection #10
This is the last blog we have to do for this class and we were asked to do it on what we learned on the semester and write our opinion about it. It was a really interesting semester we read a lot of poems, short stories, did many essays, quizzes etc… When we got to the part of the poems it was interesting how simple short poems had so much hidden in them. The way they are written can be describing a certain part of the poem, the comparisons made indirectly, the messages they are sending, the way it can be interpreted in many ways but you want to see it by the author’s eyes because you want to find out what his real purpose was when he wrote it. The only thing I really don’t like about them is all the rules they have for them. For example you have to count the stanzas, see if it’s a trochee, figurative language etc…things that well for me don’t make sense. Maybe if I understood them they would make sense but frankly I don’t in English. In Spanish I understand it a little better.
I liked reading the stories because in “The Boy without a Flag” he fought for what he believed in, in “The White Elephant” how everything was symbolic of an abortion, and so many others read in class. I like that in class from what we read we discuss it and we have the liberty of expressing ourselves no matter what the professor actually knows about the stories. He doesn’t take our comments for granted and opens his mind into seen them in our perspective or point of view.
My opinion: Liked the class except for the part of looking for the different parts of the poems. It was a pleasure taking the first and second part of this course with you. I didn’t like the quizzes too much, but its part of the course, so it’s ok. Take care.
Saturday, May 5, 2007
*****MAUS*******
Reflection #9
Maus is sort of like a novel written in form of comics. It is a novel because it’s telling a story. It’s sort of a biography; Vladek’s to be precise, written by his son Artie. It’s a story about the holocaust, how he had to go through that awfulness with his wife Anja, Artie’s mother, and how they had to move from place to place, how they lost their first son, how they had to separate and how that had to bribe and exchange the only things they had to get food and to stay alive. I found it really unique the way that he instead of using humans to represent the Jews, Germans, Polish and Americans, as it’s normally done, he used mice to represent the Jews, Cats to represent the Germans, Pigs to represent the Polish and Dogs to represent the Americans.
It’s impressing to read and imagine what Jews went through in the holocaust. How some did survive that maybe if something like that happened again today their would be even less survivors because now we live so comfortably that frankly many people you just take their cell phones away for a couple of hours and they feel useless and actually start depending on them imagine not having food, where to sleep, bathrooms, the normal everyday necessities.
In the story Artie doesn’t understand why his father acts the way he does (he doesn’t want to spend any money, wants everything to last forever, etc…) but in a way I do understand him. All of the things in the holocaust did affect him emotionally and psychologically. It was a long time that they had to live saving every single thing they could get their hands on to survive and now we don’t care about any of it, we throw food and things that can be reused by others and also there are people hungry in this world that wish they had at least a piece of bread in their house for their family every morning and we throw it away because we forgot to eat it because of so many food that we have in our fridge.
It’s a great novel and it’s written as a comic book so that it attracts every reader’s attention. It’s very interesting because you learn also history and it can be read easily and quickly.
Maus is sort of like a novel written in form of comics. It is a novel because it’s telling a story. It’s sort of a biography; Vladek’s to be precise, written by his son Artie. It’s a story about the holocaust, how he had to go through that awfulness with his wife Anja, Artie’s mother, and how they had to move from place to place, how they lost their first son, how they had to separate and how that had to bribe and exchange the only things they had to get food and to stay alive. I found it really unique the way that he instead of using humans to represent the Jews, Germans, Polish and Americans, as it’s normally done, he used mice to represent the Jews, Cats to represent the Germans, Pigs to represent the Polish and Dogs to represent the Americans.
It’s impressing to read and imagine what Jews went through in the holocaust. How some did survive that maybe if something like that happened again today their would be even less survivors because now we live so comfortably that frankly many people you just take their cell phones away for a couple of hours and they feel useless and actually start depending on them imagine not having food, where to sleep, bathrooms, the normal everyday necessities.
In the story Artie doesn’t understand why his father acts the way he does (he doesn’t want to spend any money, wants everything to last forever, etc…) but in a way I do understand him. All of the things in the holocaust did affect him emotionally and psychologically. It was a long time that they had to live saving every single thing they could get their hands on to survive and now we don’t care about any of it, we throw food and things that can be reused by others and also there are people hungry in this world that wish they had at least a piece of bread in their house for their family every morning and we throw it away because we forgot to eat it because of so many food that we have in our fridge.
It’s a great novel and it’s written as a comic book so that it attracts every reader’s attention. It’s very interesting because you learn also history and it can be read easily and quickly.
Monday, April 16, 2007
Madame Butterfly
Reflection#8
In this reflection I will be summarizing Madame Butterfly. It’s a very confusing play about a man who is in a cell talking about his life and how he compares it to a play that he saw once named Madame Butterfly. Gallimard the main character is very innocent in many aspects and slow in catching things. He is married to Helga and they couldn’t have babies so she goes to the doctor even though they had decided to keep on trying. She finds out that there is nothing wrong with her so she asks her husband to go to the doctor to see if the defect is in him. He meets this Chinese actress named Song who does opera and falls in love with her because of her beauty etc… but it turns out that she is a man and he doesn’t know. From what the play says he is a homosexual but doesn’t want Gallimard to know. Since his wife couldn’t give him a baby and they had had relations before so she claims to be pregnant. He wants to marry her but she refuses. She looks for a baby in china that would have qualities that a Western man would have so that it would be more believable. Gallimard was named vice-consul by the French ambassador to china named Manuel Toulon so he was a very occupied man involved in revolution issues and treaties etc… He was a diplomat living in china but he was then transferred because even though he was chosen for that job because of his mind and intelligence all the things he had said that could be good for china were not working so he was transferred him to France. He then tells his wife Helga that he was unfaithful to her for 8 years with Song and that even though he couldn’t marry Song he wanted to get divorced. She returns they get married and live together for twenty years and then he finds out she’s a man and starts telling her about all the lies he had to put up with for all those years etc… I found this play to be really long and sometimes confusing because of the characters and many other parts that I couldn’t put together but it’s really impressing how someone could live with a person for twenty years and not know that it was a man by his side and not a woman…weird.
In this reflection I will be summarizing Madame Butterfly. It’s a very confusing play about a man who is in a cell talking about his life and how he compares it to a play that he saw once named Madame Butterfly. Gallimard the main character is very innocent in many aspects and slow in catching things. He is married to Helga and they couldn’t have babies so she goes to the doctor even though they had decided to keep on trying. She finds out that there is nothing wrong with her so she asks her husband to go to the doctor to see if the defect is in him. He meets this Chinese actress named Song who does opera and falls in love with her because of her beauty etc… but it turns out that she is a man and he doesn’t know. From what the play says he is a homosexual but doesn’t want Gallimard to know. Since his wife couldn’t give him a baby and they had had relations before so she claims to be pregnant. He wants to marry her but she refuses. She looks for a baby in china that would have qualities that a Western man would have so that it would be more believable. Gallimard was named vice-consul by the French ambassador to china named Manuel Toulon so he was a very occupied man involved in revolution issues and treaties etc… He was a diplomat living in china but he was then transferred because even though he was chosen for that job because of his mind and intelligence all the things he had said that could be good for china were not working so he was transferred him to France. He then tells his wife Helga that he was unfaithful to her for 8 years with Song and that even though he couldn’t marry Song he wanted to get divorced. She returns they get married and live together for twenty years and then he finds out she’s a man and starts telling her about all the lies he had to put up with for all those years etc… I found this play to be really long and sometimes confusing because of the characters and many other parts that I couldn’t put together but it’s really impressing how someone could live with a person for twenty years and not know that it was a man by his side and not a woman…weird.
Sunday, March 25, 2007
mY poEm...enJOY!!!
Reflection#7
For this journal entry since the professor said that it was free topic and since we are talking about poems in my Spanish class I had to write a type of poem called a “décima” and I am going to share it with you guys and tell you its meaning. Hope you guys like it and I would like to know your opinion on this poem and also if you see it in a different perspective as I do. It’s called Patria Mía….
For this journal entry since the professor said that it was free topic and since we are talking about poems in my Spanish class I had to write a type of poem called a “décima” and I am going to share it with you guys and tell you its meaning. Hope you guys like it and I would like to know your opinion on this poem and also if you see it in a different perspective as I do. It’s called Patria Mía….
Patria Mía
Si los tiempos han cambiado
Todos los que nos marginan
Y los que nos discriminan
Estereotipo afectado
La violencia ha aumentado
Patria mía, porque dañar
Nuestros bellos despertar
Puerto Rico que ha pasado
Que mucho hemos cambiado
Quisiera a mi país calmar
I wrote this poem thinking about the way things have changed in all this years. By talking to our grandparents we can see how times have really changed. In those times they use to work really hard for what they wanted and there weren’t so many crimes as today. We have the tendency to say that Puerto Rico has no progress, that it has changed a lot and not for the best but we don’t do anything to make it better. For this stereotype that they have stamped us with for years can be called a mistake. We don’t work anymore; we don’t fight for what we want. We like everything in our hands. We don’t work as one to make our island be what it use to be once a long time ago.
Si los tiempos han cambiado
Todos los que nos marginan
Y los que nos discriminan
Estereotipo afectado
La violencia ha aumentado
Patria mía, porque dañar
Nuestros bellos despertar
Puerto Rico que ha pasado
Que mucho hemos cambiado
Quisiera a mi país calmar
I wrote this poem thinking about the way things have changed in all this years. By talking to our grandparents we can see how times have really changed. In those times they use to work really hard for what they wanted and there weren’t so many crimes as today. We have the tendency to say that Puerto Rico has no progress, that it has changed a lot and not for the best but we don’t do anything to make it better. For this stereotype that they have stamped us with for years can be called a mistake. We don’t work anymore; we don’t fight for what we want. We like everything in our hands. We don’t work as one to make our island be what it use to be once a long time ago.
Monday, March 12, 2007
SEX WITHOUT LOVE
Reflection #6
For this journal entry I frankly didn’t know which poem to write about or what to say about them because as you all know poems are interpreted by everyone in a different way. The only person who knows its real meaning is the one who wrote it, in other words the author.
I chose the poem written by Sharon Olds, “Sex without Love”, because I agree with the way she thinks and in the way she writes the poem it’s just so true. Having sex on today’s days it’s just plain normal. It doesn’t even matter with who you do it with. People already lost even the meaning of what a kiss is. Now you give a kiss to just about anyone. I’m not saying that everyone thinks or acts that way but majority rules, unfortunately. How can you have sex with a person that you don’t love? How can you give your body to a person that might not deserve you at all? I mean we are more than just a sex object but frankly we don’t value ourselves. I mean like they say it’s just for the pleasure but how about when it all ends… do you actually feel satisfied and happy or do you feel empty inside or just normal like if that was just one more of the many that have passed through your hands…We need to be careful because we have made this a normal routine, part of our everyday life and it shouldn’t be this way. This should be something special and nice shared with only the person you love and that are going to be with the rest of your life…but not everyone thinks the same way so just think about the consequences that this could lead to and the values you’ve been taught.
For this journal entry I frankly didn’t know which poem to write about or what to say about them because as you all know poems are interpreted by everyone in a different way. The only person who knows its real meaning is the one who wrote it, in other words the author.
I chose the poem written by Sharon Olds, “Sex without Love”, because I agree with the way she thinks and in the way she writes the poem it’s just so true. Having sex on today’s days it’s just plain normal. It doesn’t even matter with who you do it with. People already lost even the meaning of what a kiss is. Now you give a kiss to just about anyone. I’m not saying that everyone thinks or acts that way but majority rules, unfortunately. How can you have sex with a person that you don’t love? How can you give your body to a person that might not deserve you at all? I mean we are more than just a sex object but frankly we don’t value ourselves. I mean like they say it’s just for the pleasure but how about when it all ends… do you actually feel satisfied and happy or do you feel empty inside or just normal like if that was just one more of the many that have passed through your hands…We need to be careful because we have made this a normal routine, part of our everyday life and it shouldn’t be this way. This should be something special and nice shared with only the person you love and that are going to be with the rest of your life…but not everyone thinks the same way so just think about the consequences that this could lead to and the values you’ve been taught.
Monday, March 5, 2007
Poems
Reflection #5
For this journal entry I will talk about a couple of Poems that we read in class from chapter 22 named Images. Let’s start with the meaning of image. From what the book describes image is language that addresses the senses. In my words image in a poem is the way in which you write something and by reading it you can use your five senses: touch, smell, feel, taste and see (or imagine the scenario). As chapter 22 says one of the most common images in poetry is the visual because the poems tend to make us use our imagination a lot and imagine every single passage in it.
The first poem that I’m going to be talking about is William Carlos Williams’ “Poem”. It is describing a cat who is walking very slowly and mysteriously then jumping on top of a closet and carefully stepping down into a flowerpot. With the words carefully used in this poem you can visualize the cat doing all of these movements and if you do have a cat for a pet you know how they tend to act. How they can be really not trust worthy etc…
The second poem it’s called “Windsurfing” written by David Solway. This poem describes how does it feel to windsurf from the moment you are standing in the beach getting ready to do this sport to when you’re riding this waves. How your adrenaline rushes through your veins and the balance you must keep to be able to tame the waves you are riding among other things. By reading a poem like this you just want to be out there and even though you might not know how to you get this rush inside that you would like to learn quick just to feel the same feeling the author is describing in his poem.
For this journal entry I will talk about a couple of Poems that we read in class from chapter 22 named Images. Let’s start with the meaning of image. From what the book describes image is language that addresses the senses. In my words image in a poem is the way in which you write something and by reading it you can use your five senses: touch, smell, feel, taste and see (or imagine the scenario). As chapter 22 says one of the most common images in poetry is the visual because the poems tend to make us use our imagination a lot and imagine every single passage in it.
The first poem that I’m going to be talking about is William Carlos Williams’ “Poem”. It is describing a cat who is walking very slowly and mysteriously then jumping on top of a closet and carefully stepping down into a flowerpot. With the words carefully used in this poem you can visualize the cat doing all of these movements and if you do have a cat for a pet you know how they tend to act. How they can be really not trust worthy etc…
The second poem it’s called “Windsurfing” written by David Solway. This poem describes how does it feel to windsurf from the moment you are standing in the beach getting ready to do this sport to when you’re riding this waves. How your adrenaline rushes through your veins and the balance you must keep to be able to tame the waves you are riding among other things. By reading a poem like this you just want to be out there and even though you might not know how to you get this rush inside that you would like to learn quick just to feel the same feeling the author is describing in his poem.
Monday, February 19, 2007
What would you do if this happened to you???
Reflection #4
Evelyn is a story about a young woman who lived with her two brothers and father. Her mother had died of an illness when she was little. When her mother died her father started treating her bad. He was very strict with her and didn’t think that any guy would be good enough for her. As she got older she met a young man and they fell in love. He promised her everything, a home, happiness, love and many other things. She had had a really weird childhood because since she was the only girl and her mother had died she had to do everything in the house and deal with her father. She had the greatest opportunity in leaving this house to make her own life with the man she loved and she wasted it all. She didn’t leave with him because of the promise that she had made to her mother once of not leaving her home and trying to keep it together and she was already so accustom to that life that she got scared of new things or changes. Would you act the same way? In my case I don’t like routine and besides it’s part of life. Someday you’ll get married and start your own life away from your parents. If I had gone through something similar, as Evelyn’s case and my father were sick an alone I would get married and well live near his house so that I could take care of him too. Obviously, this would be things that I would have to talk to my fiancée first, but I think he would understand. Then everyone would be happy including me. What would you do? Would you leave your loved one?
Evelyn is a story about a young woman who lived with her two brothers and father. Her mother had died of an illness when she was little. When her mother died her father started treating her bad. He was very strict with her and didn’t think that any guy would be good enough for her. As she got older she met a young man and they fell in love. He promised her everything, a home, happiness, love and many other things. She had had a really weird childhood because since she was the only girl and her mother had died she had to do everything in the house and deal with her father. She had the greatest opportunity in leaving this house to make her own life with the man she loved and she wasted it all. She didn’t leave with him because of the promise that she had made to her mother once of not leaving her home and trying to keep it together and she was already so accustom to that life that she got scared of new things or changes. Would you act the same way? In my case I don’t like routine and besides it’s part of life. Someday you’ll get married and start your own life away from your parents. If I had gone through something similar, as Evelyn’s case and my father were sick an alone I would get married and well live near his house so that I could take care of him too. Obviously, this would be things that I would have to talk to my fiancée first, but I think he would understand. Then everyone would be happy including me. What would you do? Would you leave your loved one?
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