Dear my beloved friend......

Dear my beloved friend Fiona,

I guess that changing sides might have been not so much of great idea. Life might be different, but I am not. My heart still stays attached to the old community ... I regret many aspects, one of them, not telling you of my feelings. I know that it is prohibited, but I feel so much for it. The truth is, your beautiful, and as delicate as a flower... I realize that this letter is based on an "obsolete" word called Love. But it is, the truth.

Enough about me! How is the community doing? How is my society family doing? How is Asher doing? Most importantly, How are you doing? Has anything changed? Which brings me to the point.. Who is the new receiver? I mean, without a person with the important role as the receiver, life there might not change....

How is the original receiver doing? (the one who taught me). I know it is has been quite a while, but I know he shouldn't be, released by now... I mean, he still has a long life ahead of him. You might know that, albeit you never see really see him...

I've heard a small rumor that your community are flying in new planes for traveling! It must be nice, for you can finally visit the whole world!! Just from that... Have they opened any new jobs?

And by the way, the true meaning of love; is to feel strong emotions for a person.... Well.. Thats the way I feel for you..

Sincerely, Jonas.

Enjoy life....

"You can't separate peace from freedom because no one can be at peace unless he has his freedom."

Pages 128-129

" Gabriel's breathing was even and deep. Jonas liked having him there, though he felt guilty about the secret. Each night he gave memories to Gabriel: memories of boat rides and picnics in the sun; memories of soft rainfall against windowpanes; memories of dancing bare-footed on a damp lawn.

"Gabe?"

The new child stirred slightly in his sleep, Jonas looked over at him.

"There could be love" Jonas whispered.

The next morning, for the first time, Jonas did not take his pill. Something within him, something that had grown there through the memories, told him to throw the pill away"

Pages 126-127

'Do you love me?'

There was an awkward silence for a moment. Then Father gave a little chuckle.' Jonas. You, of all people. Precision of language, please!'

'What do you mean?' Jonas asked. Amusement was not at all what he had anticipated.

'Your father means that you used a very generalized word, so meaningless that it's become almost obsolete,' his mother explained carefully.

Jonas stared at them. Meaningless? He had never before felt anything as meaningful at the memory.

'And of course our community can't smooth function smoothly if people don't use precise language. You could ask, 'Do you enjoy me?' The answer is 'Yes,' ' his mother said.

'Or,' his father suggested, ' 'Do you take pride in my accomplishments?' And the answer is wholeheartedly 'Yes.' '

'Do you understand why it's inappropriate to use a

word like "love"?' Mother asked.

Jonas nodded. 'Yes, thank you, I do,' he replied slowly.

It was his first lie to his parents."

Freedom is what might cause happiness. Without freedom, you will never see anything, but the same discoveries the same time, over and over again. This is what Jonas feels. In fact, from what I believe, Jonas' community does not feel much, for the thought of freedom. Some people become so greedy with the thought of freedom, they create war, and, of course, this was their Decision. Some were to crazy and started world wars. For example; Adolf Hitler. He was a man who first went to jail, because he had started to deceive the government, and based the aim of a revolution. He failed. Sooner he wrote a book called 'Mein Kampf' (My Struggle). After a few years, he created the idea of a world war.... And so... A World War took place in history.

Jonas had made a decision. He had decided to ask his parents if they 'loved' him. As an answer, his dad 'chuckled' and corrected him of 'vocab' usage. This shows the freedom that Jonas felt. He even lied at the end! For he knew his father and mother would not understand "strange," new concepts. Words that have a strong meaning, only to be diminished by the fact that, the committee had blocked the feelings.

In the passages, that the teacher, it shows freedom and choice. For Jonas had risked both, as he had taken it to the edge at the end of the story, when he leaves to join a new society "over there." (Quote from; The Giver, Written by Lois Lowry).

The Giver #2

Why does The Giver say that making choices would be frightening for people?

Ever since the community had started the 'unique' rules. The society had learned just to trust the 'great' committee. What if the community made a mistake, would everyone follow? Or would they make their own choice? They might be frightened, for the committee might supply a consequence, for the person to have taken the 'leaders' place. They might have been under pressure to make a decision, if to contribute time to one

friend, and leave out the other? To save one person, and to leave the other to die? This would be examples of pressuring choices. The Giver might have went back into his memories, just to watch people suffer from decisions.

"Or what if," he went on, almost laughing at the absurdity, "They chose their own jobs?"
"Frightening, isn't it?" The giver said.
Jonas chuckled. "Very frightening. I can't even imagine it. We really have to protect people for wrong choices."
"It's safer."
"Yes" Jonas agreed "Much safer."

This shows how Jonas and The Giver, feels about the choice of jobs. If they choose by them self, they have their OWN choice, they would have chosen what they wanted the most. When if the committee chose for them, they might have chosen a job that the person liked, but not loved. What would happen if the committee, released a person who only depended on the committee for choices? Would he die, because he would not know which way to travel? How would he survive?

“It is our choices that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.”

(http://thinkexist.com/quotations/choice/)

The Giver....

The Giver is an interesting book. Focused on a boy named Jonas, in a society where there is no pain, no hunger, and hardly any death. A 'unique' society. These people are living in a town, where there is no color but black and white, and no pain. This is controlled by a group called 'The Committee'. The group controls everything about Jonas's and the other citizens life's. Ever since I have started to read the book, millions of questions had popped into my head, but I have been assigned a new question:

Why is interdependence fostered in the community?

In a 'unique community', where there is no pain, no hunger and barely any deaths. People still depend on each other to keep safe... Ever since the community, had created their 'unique' design. Young children had been taught how they can depend on others, to complete an assignment. Some depend on the other to complete simple tasks, for example, tying bow ties, helping to finish a sentence, etc. From this, people are able not to get into fights about small things. Therefore, creating a safe society.

All of these rules are enforced by a powerful group called "The committee". When a rule is enforced, the 'ragdolls' (community) follows. This shows that the society depend on 'The Committee' to know what there is to do. An example from the book; "He remembered the cheerful voice calling out, "I want my smack!"

The other Threes, including Jonas, had laughed nervously. "Snack!" They corrected. "You meant snack, Asher!" But the mistake had been made. And precision of language was one of the most important tasks of small children. Asher had asked for a smack." (Page 55) This shows how mistakes might be taken as granted, and sooner, punished.

Interdependence may have variables. Albeit small, they can be important. Jonas's community, has shown that they have a very controlled society, and look into the new rule before they publish it. What might go wrong is, if they don't look into the question, there might be some type of variable. Therefore, creating mischief or pain for the citizens. So if the committee is not careful, they might lose their status as the leaders.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=za6zvvhbJrE

1. Why do you think Ancient Egyptian Pharaohs created monuments?

I believe that there could be many answers, but the most common would be that they built monuments to show how powerful, or special they were. They might have wanted to show to the

future people that they were in power in a certain time. My pharaoh, Senusret 1

built 'The White Chapel'. This he built in a unique fashion, just to celebrate his 30th year as a ruler. So I believe there could be a variety of reasons for this.

2. What monuments in our society are similar? (be sure to provide explanations and graphics).

Societies around the world, have monuments to keep in memory of a time. The pyramids of the ancient Egyptians,Pyramids of the ancient Egyptians could be compared to the Eiffel Tower which is similar in shape to the pyramids. I also believe, coffins that we have nowadays are similar to sarcophagus's, for they both hold corpses and they are both buried. (Either in a pyramid or the ground)

3. How did the using google docs as the main portal for collaboration help you with this assignment?

Google Docs proved itself useful from when we created the Imovie, because it held the script of what we should say. It held all the facts that Shin Young and I used to create the script. Google Docs was also easier, because first of all it was connected to our email, and second our script or facts were almost impossible to

lose, because we would not have to save it on a thumb drive, (a thumb drive is easy to lose work with).

4. What did you learn from this assignment?

I learnt mostly a lot of facts about my pharaoh, Ex: Senusret the first, built the White Chapel.People believe that the White Chapel was covered in gold on the inside, and covered in script on the outside. And was built for the celebration of Senustret's 30th year of ruling. There were also interesting facts, ex: Senusret had possible daughters, Nensed, Itakayet, and Neferuptah. Nensed's name appeared on a plate frag

ment that was found outside of a temple. Itakayet's name was inscribed on a bowl found near his pyramid. Finally, Neferuptah's name was inscribed onto an ivory wand found near his pyramid. I also learnt a few facts of how to solve an Imovie problem.(Shin young and I had a problem to record sounds for our I movie, so we spent a long period of time figuring what the solution was).

5. What was challenging?

I presume that the hardest part was that Shin Young (my partner) and I had problems to record the sound from the Imovie. Because of this we spent 3/4s of the time we were given in class to find the solution. Luckily we managed.

6. Which schoolwide learning results were evident in this assignment?

I believe that there were a few Schoolwide Learning Results, (6 SLRs), evident on this assignment. The most explicit SLRs were Communicate Effectively, Collaborate Constructively and Learning Enthusiastically. There are some other

SLRS that were used, (the fourth one) Reasoning Critically, but the three (Communicate Effectively, Collaborate Constructively and Learning Enthusiastically) were the most important.

https://docs.google.com/a/iskl.edu.my/present/edit?id=0AUP1eF_nA4e6ZGNubjYyZjlfMjJjcndtYjdocg&hl=en

1) What you believe you did well on the project?

I believe my project responded well to the title " The place I call home" and some extra, interesting facts.I chose the city Landsberg, Germany.This presentation was hard, for some sites were in German and held little facts. Germany holds many little cities, Landsberg being one of the smallest. Most of the pictures that I had in my presentation were a little blurry but still fine.

2) What you would improve for future presentations/projects?
I would improve by having more facts in a project or presentation next time. I would also improve my speech,(to try to memorize my facts, so I can look at the audience while talking). Other than that, I felt confident in the end, as I was scared to make the presentation in the beginning

3) What did you learn from your preparation (for your presentation) in addition to the presentations of others?
From what I learnt from other presentations I feel that I can now carefully understand other countries/city's religions or their culture. Some things I learnt was that, Colombo was used as a trading belt by the Portuguese in 1540 and that the population of Malaysia is so high! I also learnt facts about Germany too, for example I learnt about Der Jung Fern Sprung Turm, ( The Virgin Jump Tower). Where girls jumped off the top of the tower to escape from Swedish solders.

4) What is your analysis of your performance?

I believe that I did good and should receive a O.K grade for my performance, because I could have memorized my facts and possibly added more facts for the presentation.

Thank you for reading my blog post....!

My New Year Resolutions 2011!

Welcome to the new year 2011! Feeling any different? Resolutions can be hard to compile , but even more difficult to fulfill. Some resolutions might be easier to accomplish, for example: lose weight, go to the gym, Etc.. Some might be harder,: See snow during Christmas, buy a new car, Etc. My resolutions are somewhat simple: Learn some physics and be more organized... 

My first resolution, : Learn some physics. I choose this resolution because, ever since 5th grade I have been wanting to learn about air pressure and how it works, which is part of physics. Physics, in my opinion explains the work of atoms, motion, air pressure, surrounding momentum, pressure, gravity and many, many other aspects. My second resolution: Become more organized. I choose this resolution for, I often lose my stuff..With a world of disorganised people, the world would be lost... 

                                  

Intelligence without ambition is a bird without wings.~Salvador Dali

To add on to 2011 the new year, I will speak of the favorite part of my holiday... Snow. In all my travels to Europe I have only experienced a little bit of snow, 2 times to be exact. This time we went to Düsseldorf, and what a surprise to see snow in a place that rarely snows. I was still missing school but this was a dream come true.. After a while the snow started to melt and the roads turned into ice. We tried to skate on the roads..! This was not the end of snow. The snow emerged again a few days later, but even higher Even the snowman we built days before was covered in snow until his hips! 

From that came Hence my first white Christmas, and a great New Year celebration.What I love more than snow, is the feeling of the start of a new year. You get to start off fresh. Who knows what you will achieve? What special goals have you completed last year? What have you left behind you? It gives us a chance to contemplate and to perhaps learn from our past achievements and failures.