GROWING UP SAUDI NONFITION READING RESPONSE

This week I read a nonfiction article from the New York Times Upfront called, “Growing Up Saudi” by Karen Elliot House. It’s about the young people in Saudi Arabia and how the young are increasingly questioning authority and rocking foundations of this very conservative Islamic society. In Saudi Arabia, specifically in Thalia Street of Riyadh belongs to the rebellious youth. It is an example of tension tearing at Saudi society, as tradition is challenged by modernity.

The youth which are as author Karen says “internet savvy”, so they are well aware of the Western ways but they don’t have almost any freedom options open for them. Saudi Arabia forbids dating, there are few public soccer fields, concerts are outlawed, even listening to music is forbidden by conservative sheikhs, though is widely ignored. Things that is such a normality for us is being forbidden for Saudi’s and they want to experience the joy and freedom we feel. People already started rebelling by breaking certain rules like listening to music and dating secretly. But because Saudi is a authoritarian society there is more to rebel against.

Now certain powers of Saudi I understand have nothing against even though it sets many limitations. A strict fundamentalist interpretation known as Wahhabism governs all aspects of life in Saudi Arabia. The Koran and the teachings of the prophet Mohammed effectively serve as the constitution. Unrelated men and women are totally segregated from one another. Women must wear black head to toe coverings called abayas in public. Marriages are arranged by families with the couple usually meeting for the first time when they become engaged. Since the majority of Saudi is Islamic it makes sense that they make women where abayas. Also arranged marriage isn't a shocker in the east. Unlike on the western side of the world arranged marriage isn't shocking it’s quite common. Even my own parents’ marriage was arranged.

With all these restrictions and limitations it must be hard for Saudi youth who knows of a “different world of their own” and doesn't have access to the same ways. One Saudi single man is quoted in the article saying, “Facebook opens the doors of our cages. The young understand it is part of nature to have a girlfriend or boyfriend and we should not pretend it isn't happening”. This quote in my opinion summarizes my outlook of how the rebellious youth of Saudi Arabia and how bored and restless they are.

             

Memories by Jessica Das

Memories 

My brain harbors memories;

Or what I think are memories.

Some blurred

Others are vivid and clear as if it was yesterday.

Memories make me up

The same way cells do;

Each different from the rest,

Yet still connected.

Memories make me up.

I have transformed but they

Remain the same.

Some are deep down deranged

Others are happy hopeful

Like the indication of God

Memories are me.

JESSICA DAS                                                                                                                  809

Poetry Reading Response on Starry Night

I never saw myself as a poem person. In matter of fact I was dreadful when I heard our next subject in ELA was poetry. This week I’ve read a poem called Starry Night by Anne Sexton. I was pleasantly surprised by how much I liked the poem. It’s a poem off the artwork Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh. One discovery I made about the poem Starry Night by Anne Sexton is that the speaker is depressed. This is because in the poem she seems suicidal and has dark thoughts.

One important observation I made is the speaker is suicidal. For example in the poem the line “This is how I want to die” (Sexton 6, 12) is repeated several times in the text. This quote shows that the speaker is depressed because he is having thoughts about how he wants to die and how. This quote is also an example of verbal irony because most people don’t want to die yet in this quote the speaker contradicts what I expected her to say; instead the speaker says she wants to die.

Another important observation is the speaker has dark thoughts. In the poem the speaker says, “The town does not exist/ except where one black-haired tree slips/Up like a drowned women in the hot sky” (Sexton 3). This quote is an example of a simile. This is because the tree is compared to a drowned women in the sky by using the word like. This quote shows the speaker has dark thoughts about people and herself. This is because drowning is usually paired with death.

A final observation I made is the speaker sees herself as lifeless. This is shown in the poem when the speaker says, “Sucked up by that great dragon/ to split from my life with no flag/ no belly/ no cry”.  The line break in this quote is important because it emphasizes the fact that he is empty both physically and mentally.This quote shows that life has been taken away from the speaker and nothing is left. When there is no life there is only death and darkness.

I discovered many things in this poem such as the speaker wants to be free and die. The biggest discovery I made was that the speaker is depressed by the way she speaks her words and the specific words used in the poem. Vincent Van Gogh, the artist behind the painting was in a mental asylum when he drew the painting Starry Night and ended up killing himself. He was mental and depressed. I believe the speaker got into Vincent’s mind and got into the depressed mindset that he might have been in.

Alphabet Poem- ON TOP

Always was on the top

But then came middle school

Couldn’t see why but,

Didn’t know what to do.

Even my parents were confused;

Friends were just as scared as I,

Going through the same troubles

Having the same problems.

I didn’t know what to do

Just rolled with it

Knew something was different

Let time solve it.

Mind boggling situations

Never knew how to solve it

Options, options, options

Problem solvers near by

Quizzing me day and night

Rest is not option

Slowing down isn’t my style

Turning around sounds nice

Unforgiving regrets;

Venture through your brain

When nothing is left to push you

Xylophones playing in the background

Yearning for you to get back up

Zillions of ways to get back on top

Cabal the Protagonist- Character Reflection

JOHANNES CABAL THE FEAR INSTITUTE by JONATHAN L. HOWARD

I’m currently reading Johannes Cabal the Fear Institute by Jonathan L. Howard and its nothing but ordinary. In the book there is a land beyond sleep made up of dreams called the Dreamlands but not a dream itself. For millions of years people have explored this mystical land but never truly come back sane but now its Johannes Cabal’s turn to explore. Cabal is a necromancer which means he communicates with ghosts. If you don’t believe my definition then search it in the dictionary. According to the Webster English Dictionary a necromancer is a person who can see the future and talk to the dead like a witch. Being such a guy, people keep their distance from Cabal. Well anyways, he is employed to the Fear Institute, who by the way want to capture fear, to lead an expedition to the Dreamlands. Cabal being the person that he is thinks the Fear Institute’s goal of capturing fear is stupid and unmanageable; the real reason Cabal is going is to do some of his own research and the Fear Institute in his eye is bait for when he needs to run away from monsters.

            Cabal is a very interesting character. He’s intelligent, sarcastic, uncaring, and very anti-social with humans like Bose, Shadrach and Corde which are the three people he is guiding. The most interesting idea in the book is that according to the Dreamlands Cabal is who he wanted to be all along. This is because when a person enters the Dreamlands his exterior changes into the person he dreamt to be as a youngling. In the book Shadrach asks Cabal, “But what about you, Mr. Cabal? Why haven’t your clothes changed?” Corde then asked, “Because you’re already what you want to be, eh, Cabal?” Cabal then smirks and replies, “Just so”. This shows that Cabal is who he wants to be which rarely happen to the protagonist in a book.

            Being uncaring is what Cabal is. When Corde gave Cabal the Silver Key to open the portal into the Dreamland, Cabal shoved the key into Harwell, who was the Keeper of the Silver Key and a lunatic. Cabal shoved the key into Harwell’s forehead and killing him because Harwell himself was the gate to the Dreamlands. This is because only the truly poetic and loony people, which Cabal believes to be the same thing could open the portal. Cabal had no regret whatsoever in killing Harwell. When Bose in disbelief and horror yelled, “You killed him” (Howard 42), Cabal simply shrugged, “He was already dead. He’d allowed certain conceptual the morphs to take residence in his mind. He would have killed himself or been killed within a few months in any case. At least this way he served a purpose. He was a poet. No loss, then.”(Howard 43). Just by reading that quote, anyone with common sense could see he was cold hearted but also very intelligent. He is intelligent and as a reader I know this because the way Cabal speaks with such vocabulary; he had to be educated a great deal.

            I’m not done with the book yet but fairly deep. The story just gets more crazy and unexpected at the turn of each page. I recommend this book because it’s a book that will take you on an adventure and Cabal is character that you will be in a love-hate relationship with because of his character.

Non-Fiction Reading Response

The article “A New Direction?” by Veronica Majerol in the magazine New York Times Upfront is about how China’s government has changed and tweaked certain laws to help improve China’s booming economy. According to the article in 1979, China began limiting most couples to one child; a measure to curb the country’s exploding population which by the way is not at 1.4 billion. The policy has long been a symbol of government control, violators undergoing forced abortions, and sterilizations, or paying exorbitant fines. But there was a big meeting in November, China’s communist leaders said they would relax the policy. Now if either the husband or wife were an only child they can have more than one kid. What’s for the sudden change you might ask?  Because of a preference for boys in the Chinese culture, many couples gave up their girls, creating a gender imbalance; that leaves millions of Chinese men without wives.

            Veronica Majerol’s article is unbiased and just accurately states the current conditions of China’s economy. Although the author’s article has no “loaded” words, it’s missing certain people’s perspective.  The article has the perspective of a China expert who states, “Today the agenda is largely off the table and that is the most serious long-term legacy of Tiananmen” (Joseph Fewsmith, Boston University). I believe Veronica is missing the perspective of a Chinese person who lives in America and a Chinese person who just emigrated from America to get more of a personal perspective. A personal perspective is key in this article because Chinese families are affected by the limiting of children in China; they might have their own stories related to this to share.  Also in the article Veronica states, “With its economy booming, China’s leaders also pledged to allow more private investment, moving China even further to a capitalist system”. This demonstrates that China has been improving itself to keep up with its thriving economy.

            After reading this article, I have come to understand not all countries give as much freedom to the people as America does. China for years have taken away children for the means of overpopulation and strict business, they have finally come to see how interfering with nature puts things out of order. But I appreciate the fact that China is moving forward and that the author Veronica Majerol has shown this. This has strengthen my opinion on how much power leaders should have over their people because ultimately over controlling leads to imbalance and unhappiness.

Published Reading Response

How Does A Time To Kill by John Grisham Make You Think About Justice in the World?

By: Jessica Das 809

I grew up watching Law and Order: Special Victims Unit. It showed me that justice isn't always fair and that some people, when emotionally unstable, will take the law into their own hands and commit a crime. Now I learnt all that from watching a television show for almost five years.

The book A Time to Kill by John Grisham taught me the same exact lesson but in a different format, in a different time period. A Time to Kill takes place in the conservative and racist south in the 1970s, in Ford County, Mississippi, where 73 percent of the population is white and most of them are racist. A ten year old black girl gets viciously raped by two white men by the name of Willard and Billy Ray Cobb. While the two men were coming out of their indictment from court, Carl Lee, the father of the raped girl takes the law into his own hands and kills the two rapist in cold blood. Now he is in jail and waiting to get his indictment.

The book shows me that justice doesn't always mean fair. I’m only in the beginning of the book and I have already learnt that in the 1970s whites could get easier punishments and get acquitted easier for murder than blacks. For example in the book Jake, Cobs’ white attorney says to Cobb:

“I’m white, and this is a white county. With luck I could get an all-white jury, which naturally would be sympathetic. This isn't New York or California. Mans supposed to protect his family. Some whites would admire you but most would want to see you hang. It would be much harder to win an acquittal.”(Grisham 61).

    This textual evidence shows that in the 1970s that justice wasn't nondiscriminatory, it used to depend on skin color.

            Another way justice wasn’t fair was because people in the court such as jurors were bought off or intimidated by threats from people like the Ku Klux Klan, to think a certain way. For example in the book Harry Rex a well-known lawyer tells Jake, “That’s Bill Joe he can be bought off. We pay him, he will say anything you want him to say”. This was when Harry and Jake were looking through the list of possible jurors and seeing who would make good ones. The evidence proves that justice isn’t fair because some people would do anything for money and if your rich you usually you got your way when you fell into trouble.

    Now comparing justice back then and now I believe that justice is fair, depending where the location is fairness varies but at least today the government goes through a lot more for a person to have a fair trial. In the book, the one who is being charged with the crime, depending on how much power he or she may have could get a bias jury or a jury or judge to their liking. Today, the jury is randomly selected and has to meet requirements such as no connection to the case or the people. The jury is usually a mix of different races and genders from different backgrounds so the jury can’t be bias. The point I’m trying to prove is that comparing the two time period I’m glad to say that the justice system may not be equal and fair but the government at least tries to make the playing field leveled as possible the law will let it be.