Gates of Fire Dialectic Journal 7-9

Chapter 7, page 59:

"I felt it was my doing, my brothers death, as if I had willed it in secret and the gods had somehow responded to this shameful prayer. It was the most painful thing that had ever happened to me. I felt I couldn't go on living, but I didn't know how honorably to end my life."

Dienekes is having a strong feeling of regret. He is explaining how the pain of is brothers death being his fault is something that gives him great sorrow and to the point that he wants to commit suicide. This part of Gates of Fire reminds me of Secret Life of Bees. He feels that the death of his brother was his fault and Lily felt the death of her mother was her fault. The feeling of regret is very overwhelming and it surely haunts you for a long time or even for your whole life. It made Lily in Secret Life of Bees feel lonely and unloved while in Gates of Fire, Dienekes wants to take his life. Regret leads to sorrow and the loss of a loved one can be such a strong sorrow to lead someone to wanting to commit suicide.

Chapter 8, page 75:

"This is my shield. I bear it before me into battle, but its not only mine alone. It protects my brother on my left. It protects my city. I will never let my brother out of its shadow nor my city out of its shelter. I will die with my shield before me facing the enemy."

I really like this quote. Its very meaningful, powerful and it really makes me think. It represents bravery and especially honor for someones community and family. Putting others before yourself is represented in this quote. It obviously relates to war, as in fighting for your country and people. The shield represents that you died fighting for what you believed in or many other reasons that could be considered honorable or heroic in your eyes. If you were to die, you would die with the honor of a warrior who fought for your people and community. That is what the shield represents in the quote. This quote can also be changed, but still hold a very strong meaning. Instead of shield you can say my heart and instead of a brother and city, you can say friends and family. Then it would represent the bond and love of friends and family. Whenever there is a quote that I really like, I change it up to see if I can make it into something else meaningful. This quote is an excellent example.

Chapter 9, page 77:

"When they hit, he was good for nothing for minutes at a stretch. If he could not find a way to reverse this condition, he could not when he reached manhood and made a warrior; he would lose his citizenship and be left to choose between living on in some lesser state of disgrace or embracing honor and taking his own life."

Wow! Thats a burn straight to the heart for Alexandros! If he can't recover from the situation hes in, he will lose the chance to earn the title he is working his butt off for! Being a warrior is a big title and if you lose it, as it says "living on in some lesser state of disgrace of embracing honor and taking his own life." Thats horrible! The choice of living in disgrace or suicide. This shows majorly how honor plays a big role in society. Its like saying if you humiliated yourself today, its equivalent to death. Thats a scary thought I must point out. This also might of applied to other civilizations as well.

Gate Of Fire Dialectic Journal: Chapters 4-7

Chapter 4, page 21.

"This I learned then: There is always fire.
An acrid haze hangs in the air night and day, and sulphurous smoke chokes the nostrils. The sun is the color of ash , and black stones litter the road, smoking. Everywhere one looks, some object is afire. Timber, flesh, the earth itself. Even water burns. The pitilessness of flame reinforces the sensation of the gods' anger, of fate, retribution, deeds done and hell to pay."

Whoa. This quote was very intense. As soon as I read "there is always fire", I knew something big was going to happen or he was going to say something very strong. Xeones has definitely shown great intensity in what he says. For this passage, Xeones is describing what it would look like if a fire was going on. It's scary to think about that there is something always on fire, no matter what it is. We all know fire is a dangerous thing (especially in southern California), such as what it does and even what it sometimes represents. When he says "The pitilessness of flame reinforces the sensation of the gods' anger, of fate, retribution, deeds done and hell to pay" When he says hell to pay, it could be referring to the flames of hell. Being surrounded by fire is probably not the most joyful thing in the world. Its the way he describes the fire that makes it so interesting to read this passage. When he says "The sun is the color of ash , and black stones litter the road, smoking" it really hooks me in. Its similar to hearing juicy gossip, or watching a movie that has you on the end of your seat.

Chapter 5, page 28.

"Before, on my fathers farm, we had caught wild birds for our cote, or to make breeding pairs, or just to hold for an hour before returning them to freedom. Now we ate them. Bruxieus made us devour everything but the feathers. We crunched the little hallow bones; we ate the eyes, and the legs right down to the boot, discarding only the beak and the unchewable feet. We gulped the eggs raw."

Ew. I am not kidding, I cringed after reading that. That is disgusting! I can't even imagine how horrible that must have been. This was the first passage of this book to actually make me physically react. I litteraly cuffed my mouth and squinted my eyes. That was mostly because he said "We crunched the little hallow bones", which brought me in and made me feel like I was there observing that. Besides the fact that it was beyond disgusting, it represents a change or in a way a transformation. Lets think of it as chores. When we were young, we had to just simply clean up our messes or help vacuum the floor. Now that we are older we have to clean the dishes, mow the lawn, take out the trash and much more. Chores to me when I was younger wasn't a big deal and sometimes fun. Now I dread it. I have to do things I don't want to do, and the load of stuff for me to do is bigger. Being forced to do more stuff you don't want to do is an awful feeling. Even though doing chores isn't anywhere near being as bad as eating chicken bones, it is a similar transition. You go from doing something okay and fun with the chickens, to crunching up their bones in you mouth. (I'm not sure if this is the right way to think of this situation, but that's what it reminded me of when reading it)

Chapter 6, page 40.

"Then a terrifying thought struck me.
What if this is the wrong tree? Perhaps I should be leaning against that one. Or that other, over there. A panic of indecision seized me. I was in the wrong spot!"

Haha. Making choices. If anyone ever asked me the number one thing I'm bad at or my number one least favorite thing to do, my answer would be making a decision or choice. I can never decide on anything. I'm always my afraid my decisions are wrong or something that another person doesn't want. My parents always ask me what I want for dinner. Every single time they ask me that, I always say "I don't know. I'll eat whatever you want." Even today I couldn't make a choice. My mom and I were in See's candy and I was getting 3 of those Cafe Latte Lolly-pops. Then I saw a box full of mini ones. I asked my mom if it was a good idea to get the 3 pops or the box of little ones. My mom asked me to decide and I couldn't choose. I looked behind me and saw a line of people. So my mom finally chose for me (the 3 pops). Then I realized that getting the box of mini ones was a better deal. Choosing the right tree would definitely be stressful and a very tough decision. Its horrible when you make a choice and its the wrong one, so I know what that panic feeling would be like for him.

Election 2008

2008's race for President will surely go down in history. The first woman to run for President, Hilary Clinton. The first African American to run, Barack Obama and much more. This has truly been a very exciting year. But now it comes down to republican John McCain and democrat Barack Obama. Both candidates I believe have good ideas BUT! I believe John McCain would be a better President at this time rather than Obama. He might state good ideas for what they want to do for America, but can we trust them? Obama and McCain have had "Flip-Flops" but Obamas flips strike me more than McCains. What if he were to do a major Flip Flop of his ideas as president? That would surely disappoint the United States citizens considering we voted for that him to be President for what he planned to do to help us.

I remembered back to one of the debates between Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama, he bad mouths her about getting defensive about people attacking her during the debates. In this link, it says that Hilary used her gender as a cover for protection as quoted "she was pummeled in a debate with six male candidates". Barack says "So it doesn't make sense for her, after having run that way for eight months, the first time that people start challenging her point of view, that suddenly she backs off and says: 'Don't pick on me' "
In Obamas blueprint of change, on page 51, it says: "Barack has a long record of standing up for women."
Yes, it may be true that Hilary shouldn't have gotten so defensive about people picking on her and using her gender as a reason why, but, what if those 6 people WERE really picking on her because she was a woman. If Obama was truly supportive of womens rights and standing up for them, shouldn't he have stood up for Hilary?

Obama does indeed like change. Even changing his own view points! In this blog post it gives us a list of Obamas "Flip-Flops" (it states articles where he/she got the information from). One of them that struck me the most was 6th one titled "Running for President or Vice President of the United States" which said:
On the January 22nd edition of “Meet the Press,” Tim Russert and Obama had the following exchange:Russert: “When we talked back in November of ‘04 after your election, I said, ‘There’s been enormous speculation about your political future. Will you serve your six-year term as United States senator from Illinois?’”Obama: “I will serve out my full six-year term. You know, Tim, if you get asked enough, sooner or later you get weary and you start looking for new ways of saying things. But my thinking has not changed.”Russert: “So you will not run for president or vice president in 2008?” Obama: “I will not.”
Wow, Obama broke his promise as Senator. Would he break his promises in his plans for change?

It also bugs me about the amount of effort they are putting into there plans and debates.
For Obama, I see a downfall for his written plan. He doesn't describe enough about HOW hes going to change.
Again referring back to his blueprint of change, he doesn't give enough ways how hes going to change things in the US. For example, on page 52 for "Work with Mexico", Obama only gives us 1 sentence about how hes going to work with Mexico. It says: Obama believes we need to more to promote economic development in Mexico to decrease illegal immigration. After I read that, I let out a very disappointed sigh. One sentence? Anyone can write one sentence about how to work with Mexico. Actually, I bet most people can write 5 sentences! Immigration from Mexico is becoming a big debate in the United States and we need more than just a one sentence way of how the president will help change it. What I see missing in many parts of Obamas plan for change is how hes going to change it. Now, this doesn't apply for all of Obamas plans, but just a lot of them. I still believe that Obama is a good and intelligent man, but he needs to put more thought and effort into what he wants to change, who's going to be involved, when is it going to happen and much more.

This is another scary thing about Obama. In this link, Senator Barack wants to invade Pakistan and hunt down terrorist. Well, we are already in war with Iraq, why would we want to start a possible conflict with Pakistan especially in the condition we are in. This is why I want McCain as president. McCain has seen the horrors of war and he has major military experiences. Obama has NONE. You can't understand war until you see it yourself and Obama has not viewed war. The President of the United States is the Commander and Chief. If we want to get out of war soon and avoid wars, we need McCain who understands war and will only use war in the future as an extreme last resort. But now that we are in war, we do need to make sure that Iraq can govern itself and if we leave right now it will be dangerous because a civil war could break out in the middle east. We need to settle peace with them. (See McCains plan for Victory in Iraq here)

Here is my final issue I will explain about Obama's policies. He wants to lower taxes for the lower class and give higher taxes to the rich class. Yah! Sure it might sound nice and dandy, but its communism. If the lower class has less taxes, they would have more money and become part of the middle class. If the rich have higher taxes, they will obviously lose money and go to the middle class. Wow. Everyone will be middle class! What does that sound like? Communism. Also, if the rich work hard, why should they be charged more for taxes. That just seems unfair. Instead, McCain wants to just keep taxes low. (See his plan for taxes here)

Its time for some campaigning !

If you haven't seen this video, be prepared for this very hilarious video with a song that is completely stuck in my head!

Hero Blurb

This is my hero David. David is my hero because even though he didn't know me very well, he still wanted to help me when I was trouble. In the end, he successfully found out who spread the rumor about me. His kindness towards me makes him a great hero.

A picture that I like.

This is a photo I took in Massachusetts when I went on the 8th grade East Coast Trip. It is an image of the 54th Massachusetts Regiment Memorial in Boston. When I first saw this memorial, I was overwhelmed with multiple thoughts. Probably the first word that came to mind when I saw this was leader. The person on the horse is Robert Shaw. He was the leader of the 54th regiment and lead the attack on Fort Wagner during the Civil War. This regiment was the first regiment that consisted of volunteer black men. I really like this picture because it is a great powerful example of taking a big step forward to change society. It's also an example of leadership and doing something because you feel it's right. Robert Shaw could be considered a great hero (to the men he lead during the Civil War and now, if people see him as a man who took a stand against ). So this picture is a great example of him in his heroic actions.

Code of The Secret Life of Bees.

1. How accurate where your predictions?

A: Some of my predictions were correct, some were a little off.

2. Which predictions were very accurate? Describe.

A: I predicted that this book will be a bit about during the time. That was true because Lily in the story was able to see how wrong being prejudice is. I also predicted that the beginning of the book might start with an introduction of bees, which was correct because Lily was able to hear the bees in her room at the time. She also remembered stories Rosaleen told her about the bees.

3. Which predictions were less accurate? What were the differences between what you predicted and what actually happened?

A: The book was called the Secret Life of Bees, I predicted that it was going to be about the life of bees. Yes, the book does talk a little bit about the life of bees, but thats not what the book is about. I also thought that the book would be difficult to read, because I thought I would be easily confused by the content in the book, but I ended up loving the book and I didn't want to put it down. I also understood what was going on which made the book amazing!

I put the summer time image there because of August May and June. Those are the names of the Boatwrights and they are also the months of summer!