It Must Be Walked

The most amazing of journeys seem to end, not by my choice but for the one who traveled with me. You are the proof that loves does exists and it is hard to accept you are not here. We walked hand by hand in this path of hate and envy with hopes and dreams, with fears but certain and with moments of happiness. Like I said, it seems to be over even if I think it was a mistake,but the path must not be left alone, it must me continued alone for now. I have search for a solution to this loneliness, I do not know who to blame or if I have to fight against you or against myself. The thing I'm sure about is that you still love me but somehow you are not here. Now in the darkness of my room and in the darkness of the night, I lay my head against my pillow hoping that one day your hand will be there before it touches the bed and as your perfume fades away from my things, I hope that mine never fades from your memory. As I walk these empty spaces I dream that tomorrow you realize that is empty because of your absence.

My Blog Reflection

This blog has been different for last semester. Last semester was a group blog where we posted some of our journal entries. Now this blog was personal and was actually our journal. The online journal entries were about stories and novels read in class. It’s been great working in an online journal that everyone can see because they can comment about their opinions and show the way they think about mine. We could also view the entries of our group members and other classmates that opened our minds in the different point of view everyone has.
A disadvantage of this online blog is that, sometimes we do our entries late because we don’t have to hand it in the classroom. That eventually makes us forget about the assignment and then don’t do it at all. The advantages of the online blog is that after we finish the semester we can keep on writing about everything we read, write or whatever that happens in our lives. We could also keep in touch with the teacher and our classmates and their future readings and writings.

Perspectives

Frederick Winterbourne was really fond of her and her charisma, so he decides to arrange an encounter between Daisy and his aunt Mrs. Costello. Mrs. Costello was a really elegant lady who knew a lot of people, but when Frederick tries to introduce Daisy to the lady she says that they are common meaning that they are from a lower social class than her.Mrs. Walker, who was a lady the met in Italy, tries to get some sense in the mind of Daisy, because a young unmarried girl should not walk with a young man and this case two at a time. Walker think Daisy is ruining her and her reputation, but Daisy stays in her place doing what she wants. All of this fuss about Daisy Miller and her young male friends leads to a phase where everyone turned their backs on Daisy and they simply chose to not accept her behavior anymore. Mrs. Miller thinks that Daisy is engaged to Mr. Giovanelli and she talks about it with Mr. Winterbourne.Giovanelli did not even care about her and she showed in that way he disappears when she was ill.It is clear for us that Winterbourne defended Daisy in the eyes of Mrs. Costello and Mrs. Walker and that he thought that Daisy was innocent and good.In the novel “Reading Lolita in Tehran”, we can see that some people thought that “she was not merely immoral, she was “unreasonable””. Some men pointed out that Daisy was a sinner. In Iran a woman is worth half a man and her voice is not taken seriously, that why some mea think Daisy’s behavior is reckless. Some women thought that Daisy was a courageous young woman because she acted like herself at all times and no man or human being could change the way she is.

Egyptian Conception of Marriage

Marriage is the center of contemporary Egyptian social life. It is the primary focal point in the lives of both women and men, followed only by the birth of a child. There is no dating or interaction prior to the wedding, but there are other occasions where Egyptian men and women can meet each other. Usually, this will take place at a public location. It started by the parents of the man visiting to his fiancée's house to get the approval to complete the marriage and reach an agreement. In the wedding. The contract is signed by the groom with the family of the bride. The wife has the unconditional right to economic support from her husband, but she remains in control of her property, including inheritance or earned income. In case of divorce, she is entitled to three months' alimony and to those possessions that she brought with her at the beginning of her marriage or those that she acquired with her own income, as well as any portion of her mahr that is due her.

My opinion on this matter is that there are religion and culture are a strong influence on today’s human behavior. We have seen so many different types of weddings and marriages that is surprisingly hard to believe that we are the same and yet we are so different. On this marriage, I would say that, the fact that is the most important occasion on a woman’s life, followed by the birth of a child shocked me because in our society, the most important aspect of the modern life is education. We have the privileges of going to school, choosing who we want to marry and what is going to be our future and in the other part of the world is the other way. Our country is base on free will and that free will took us where we are today. Some of us may think this type of marriage is weird, but they think the same of us too.

Most of the people in the Middle Eastern are followers of the Islamic law and this is the main reason or explanation for the doubts we may have about marriage in these places. I like to think of it as a chain, the religion modifies the culture, and the culture modifies the people and the way they live. Egyptian marriages are influenced by both the Middle Eastern tradition and the European tradition and that is why some weddings are looking more like the weddings we are used to see. The Egyptians are also a patriarchal society, the man is provider no matter what the income of the woman is and he has the right to obtain the greatest part if they divorce, including the kids. Everywhere in the world there is something new to discover and today we have learned how human being have built their own systems and ways of living.

Our presentation was about Eskimo Marriage, Egyptian Marriage, African Forced Marriages, and Indian Marriage. Two of our group members were absent in the presentation day. Their topic was Japan's Arranged Marriages and Intercultural Marriage. We, the present members of the group, dressed up as our topic and one showed a video about African Forced Marriages.

Reaction to "GEORGE AND THE PINK HOUSE"

George seems like the classical grump. He screams at children and beats his family. It is so funny to see all the town boys reunited talking about his issues and aggressions. This is the story of how life makes you pay for you mistakes. There is always this kind of people in our community and is really sad to see haw this people can be like this. I would like to respond to the fact that after his wife death he passed trough a hard time with money and suddenly he has money, his house is full of women, soldiers and sailors. Some people may not get this directly, but all the women in his house were prostitutes and the sailor and the soldiers were costumers. It is at the time of his daughter wedding that people start to say that he ought to put her to better use meaning that he ought to make her another prostitute. All this boys did not understand what was happening in this man's house. After years of bothering them and after his wife death, his daughter got married and after his son moved he just died and the boys got some money together to bury him. His son went to the funeral.

Reaction to "Story of an hour"

This story is about a woman whose husband was "killed" in a train accident. It is just surprising how this story can captivate you attentions since the beginning. At first she is told that her husband was one of the dead persons in the train accident. She feels weird at first because there were all kind of thoughts in her head, but suddenly a calm attitude confused me of the true feelings of her. She showed relief and freedom and this is an uncomfortable feeling for the reader. Instead of feeling bad, sad, miserable or just confused, she feels more powerful than ever and even more self sufficient than before. The story is quite shocking because when you receive news like that the usual feeling is abandonment, sadness or confusion. One can feel alone and lost just because he was a part of you that was beside you a certain amount of time and even in the worst of circumstances marriage is a huge deal in the past and in the present. Nobody expects to see something like this and the experience of only reading this story is an important fact, because now you know that even in the real life this can happen.

Reaction to "The Storm"

This story is very interesting, because it narrates how a woman and a man get together in passion even though she has a husband and he has a wife. I like that the story expresses the encounter of the man and the woman in a delicate and mysterious way. The theme is one that society has learned to talk about over the years and it is written in a time of controversy and political changes. My favorite part of the story is the final. The son and the husband of the woman came back home after the storm and the woman behavior was absolutely normal. The man writes a letter to his wife and he shows that he cares for her and for his babies. When the storm ended everything was normal, as if nothing happened.

Reaction to "A Worn Path"

The story “A Worn Path” is really tricky to understand. At first I thought that everybody cared about Phoenix Jackson and that her grandson resulted to be dead at the end. After reading the story again and after the teacher’s suggestion about Jackson being a charity case, I notice that the story was different. Phoenix Jackson walked through the woods towards the city and she encounters with the hunter. The hunter seems kind of nice at first and we may think he cares for her, but then he wanted to feel powerful and superior and he pointed his gun at her to see if he can scare her. The woman in the town helped her with the shoelaces in a way that suggests she feels sorry for her. At the end the nurses ask her if her grandson is okay, but all this kindness is just a costume they wear to hide their true feelings for her.

Reaction to "A Walk to the Jetty"

At first you may think Annie has no love whatsoever for her family or her country. When she wakes up she lets you know that she does not want to go to England, but she does not want to stay in Antigua. Trough the story Annie describes the day of her departure. It is a very interesting story divide by half. The first half of the story she show us cold feelings about her leaving her family and Antigua. The second half of the story she is feeling more sadness as she starts to see the buildings and the people she is leaving behind. I really liked this story because it shows the change of mind of individual as time passes. I think that is usual that Annie feels a bit sad at the end, but she showed it by holding her parents’ hands tightly. I firmly believe that she wanted to hear her dad saying he loves her, but she never expresses this directly.

Reaction to "Columbus In Chains"

I think that the way of thinking of the subject in this piece of writing is presented in a very mature way. Usually when we are made to believe that the person that discovered us , in this case Christophe Columbus, is a great person filled with both religion and integrity, and the reality is always different. In this story I loved the Annie expresses her point of view about Columbus. She marked the words “The Great Man Can No Longer Just Get Up an Go” with such anger and with a certain disrespect that feels almost like she is laughing at him and marking him like they marked her ancestors that were slaves. The fact that she wrote those words in Old English lettering was also wrote to show that she mastered new things and that she is overcoming the oppression that her family felt.

Christopher Columbus

Summary of Christopher Columbus’ information
My information is about a historian’s theory about Christopher Columbus name. We have heard that nobody knows for certain where his body was buried or if he was Catalan or Genovese, but this story is different. The historian Luis Ulloa, from Peru, states that Christopher Columbus real name was John Baptist, because sometimes he signed himself as Xristo-Ferens. This name means “the bearer of Christ” and Ulloa thinks this is directly related to his name, even though most people think that this is just a form of drawing attention to himself, because he was the spreader of the Christian faith in the discovered places. The astronomer and mapmaker Jaume Ferrer de Blanes wrote to Columbus a letter that said: “I am sure I am not mistaken when I say that the position you hold, Sir, confers on you the character of God’s apostle and ambassador, ordered by His divine will to make you know His holy name in place truly unknown”. It is believed that Xristo-Ferens is derived from Columbus name and was an accepted form to say John The Baptist, this explains why he didn’t use his Italian name Cristoforo. Another point of view is the Catalan origin, but the theory was stated by an imaginary explorer named Joan Colom, whose name has not been sufficient information to trace. Columbus was a devotee of John the Baptist, this information was founded in the Libro de las Profecias, written by Columbus and Fray Gaspar Gorricio. An important fact is the name of the present Puerto Rico, that was named Saint John Baptist. This are all interesting fact about Columbus and of Luis Ulloa theory. But the search will always continue. To read more visit Cristopher Columbus, “Joan Colom” and Jon Skolp.

Perfect Like a Dream

He picked me up, like every Saturday. I felt more attracted to him than before, like it was burning inside of me, like if there was something in his body that called me, that screamed at me, like it begged for a touch, for a kiss, for something more than the usual. We loved and wanted each other in a way people would see, but ignored. I knew he was desperate, but he seemed calmed. He told me everything he wanted in sweetest of silences. Our hands touched, our lips rushed and slowly we discovered the true desire we had in the half an hour drive to the place where it all happened. It was the most interesting drive of my life, of his life, and the best prologue to the novel of or growth.
We arrived, and then it all change. Our feelings turned stronger. Kisses were stronger. He touched my back and grabbed my waist; he knew that was my favorite. Then he delicately kissed my neck and I have to admit I was so high, because his kiss was so soft and warm and filled with love that I felt like in a journey of love and discovery. He walks while kissing me, leading me to his room. Every step he took was so determined and so sure of everything, but I know he’s scared like I am too even though that was what I wanted. He filled me with confidence and with a feeling of power that anyone would get scared of. With his delicate hands, he opened the door and keep walking, but this time towards the bed. He had red curtains and his room could not feel more like home.
He put me in bed, this time his hands were free to do what they wanted. He discovered me like I discovered him. I got him out of his clothes. His sheet felt warm, and it was perfect like in movie or a dream. We got lost between the sheets, we played we laughed, we kissed, we touched, we felt invincible, we made love, yes, it is the right term for what happened there. I have never felt so love in my life, for me it was perfect, almost unreal. Once in my life thought this was wrong, but it happened, and I must admit it was the most beautiful moment of my life.
It is five in the morning of a Wednesday, I wake up without him and then it hits me again, he is not here and I dreamt about him again. Sometimes I feel he’s here, sometimes I see him, sometimes I hear him, and sometimes I feel his breath on my neck or his hand on mi waist. Then I have to continue my day, waiting for the moment I see him again. You may think I’m waiting in vain, but this time I want you to know that he always comes back, he always gets here.

Reaction "Everyday Use"

ALICE WALKER (1944- )
Everyday Use
For Your Grandmama
Reaction

I read Everyday Use before in High School and we really thought lot about it. Personally I think Dee’s attitude towards the burning of the hose and her sister, the state her family lived in or the way she acted about it and said she would not bring friends is totally selfish. Maggie seems like a really shy girl, who thinks life is not giving her opportunities, she is always with her mother, this attitude comes after she burned her skin when the house burned down. I think Dee’s motive for coming home with her friend was trying to get valuable thing from her house so she can own it or sell it. I really felt that Maggie and her mother have great love for the objects that reflects their heritage and past. When Dee arrives to the house with her friend she does not shows affection to her sister or mother she just takes pictures and focused on quilts that her grandma and aunt did by themselves and other things around the hose, showing more interest on those things that in her family. I clearly get that Dee was ashamed of the way she lived in and she changed her name because of that and because of the fact that she felt her family chasing her trough her name. Some of our families have that special skill and talent that everyone knows us for and for that we should value all those thing we learn, because that is going to be one of the most valuable memories of our childhood and our lives.