My Sister's Keeper: Blog 1 

What would you do if your sister's life meant risking your own?

    Personally I would do almost anything for my sister, but the things that Anna has to do for Kate are pretty extreme. She was born to be a donor to Kate and I can see how that makes her feel inferior to Kate and Jesse. Starting from when she was born to her now at 13 she has been going through constant surgeries and get shots all the time and that seems ridiculous to me. And now, Anna is going to be forced to give up a kidney to Kate which will effect her for the rest of her life. I can't say for sure that I would have stood up for myself when it meant my sister could die because you never really know what you would do until you are put into a situation like this. 

Anna and Kate 

(http://www.miami.com/sites/migration.miami.com/files/images/sisters%20keeper2%20wkend26.JPG)

If I were a parent I don't know if I could do that to my child. It is one thing to have one child with cancer going through dialysis and surgeries and everything else but to willingly put another daughter through surgeries like that is not something I could see myself doing. If I were to have my child do all of these surgeries I would feel obligated to ask her if she would be okay with it and to make her feel comfortable saying no. I couldn't have my child going through life thinking that all she is is a donor for her sister. 

I understand completely why Anna is starting to speak up for herself and is looking to be medically emancipated from her parents. But I can also understand the reaction that her parents, especially her mother has, when they figure it out. Her mother practically lives for Kate and would do anything to keep her alive, including making Anna give up so much for her. Not once has she ever asked Anna if it was okay to do any of the things that have been done to her and I don't find that fair at all. 

Blog 3 for The Help: Lack of Parenting Skills 

(Spoilers: Finished the book)

There are many parental qualities that the character, Elizabeth Leefolt, lacks in The Help. A mother should be nurturing and give her baby a lot of attention. These are traits that are practically non-existent when it comes to Mrs. Leefolt and her husband as well. Mrs. Leefolt's help, Aibileen, describes to us the way that Elizabeth treats Mae Mobley and it is very disturbing to me. Rather than pick her baby up when she is crying, Mrs. Leefolt will leave her screaming in her crib for sometimes hours at a time if Aibileen is not there to take care of her. 

A quote from Aibileen that I think perfectly describes Mrs. Leefolt's feelings toward her daughter is "Ever so often, I come to work and find her bawling in her crib, Miss Leefolt busy on the sewing machine rolling her eyes like its a stray cat stuck in the screen door." (page 4) The way Mrs. Leefolt treats her child is horrible and no child at that age or any age should ever have to go through that. Aibileen tries her hardest to make Mae Mobley feel important.

A quote from Aibileen Clark towards Mae Mobley

(whatwillmatter.com)

I think that this a very important quote in this book. Aibileen knows that Mae Mobley does not ever receive kind remarks from her mother and it is very important to Aibileen that Mae feels special. She tells Mae Mobley every day that she is kind, smart and important. When Aibileen gets fired at the end of the book, she makes sure to say this one last time to Mae Mobley and hopes that it will stick with her throughout the rest of her life, because she knows she will rarely here it from her mother. 

I read an article about parenting and things that can cause stress among children. (http://kidshealth.org/parent/emotions/feelings/stress.html#) One of these stressors is separation from their parents. Mrs. Leefolt is usually always with Mae Mobley but that doesn't mean that she treats her how she should be treated. I wouldn't say that Mrs. Leefolt is ever truly present in Mae's life considering the amount of times she leaves her screaming in her crib wondering what she is doing wrong and why her mother refuses to even look at her. This stress can develop into much greater problems later on in her life and could cause her to rebel against her mother completely because of the lack of attention she has received from her all throughout her childhood. 

Heroism 

(Spoilers!! Read the whole book)

My definition of a hero would be someone that consistently stands up for what they believe in despite what the consequences of their actions could be. A hero could also be someone who helps others no matter what could come of it.

In The Help, I would say that Aibileen, Minny and Skeeter are all very heroic characters.

Skeeter, Minny, and Aibileen
(http://www.lightsremoteaction.com/2011/08/help-theatrical-review.html)

They are all risking their lives in order to show the world the relationship of colored maids in the south. Skeeter loses all of her friends because they figure out about her carrying Jim Crow Laws in her bag and at the end of the book they end up finding out that Skeeter was the one to write The Help. Despite knowing how her friends would react if they ever found out about her writing the book, she continued to do it anyway because she did not agree with the way that they were treating their maids and felt she needed to do something about it.

Aibileen and Minny are risking their lives to get their stories out there. They know what could happen to them if they get caught. It is not like where Skeeter would just be shunned for what she did, Aibileen and Minny would most likely be killed for helping Minny with the book, along with all of the other maids who chose to tell their stories. When Skeeter’s old best friend Hilly Holbrook finds out that Aibileen’s story was in the book, she made her friend Elizabeth Leefolt fire Aibileen and she was forced to leave. She knew she would never be able to find another job because Hilly was the town gossip and the whole town of Jackson would soon find out about it. Minny’s husband abuses her and she knew that if he ever found out he would hurt her very bad, but she decided to tell her story anyway.

All of these characters have heroic qualities and show bravery countless times in this book because they feel they need to get the word out about the way the help is treated in Jackson, MS. 

Making a Difference 

(Spoilers: I have read the whole book!) 

     In the book The Help by Kathryn Stockett, the character Skeeter is a very important one. She is white in her early twenties living in Jackson, Mississippi. She has grown up with a maid her whole life and has never treated her maids like most of the white woman in this city do. Her friend, Hilly Holbrook, is a great example of how mistreated the maids are. She had started "The Home Help Sanitation Initiative" which called for each home having a separate bathroom for the help because she believed that these woman carried diseases that could be very harmful to white families. 

Skeeter from the Help, with a line from the movie as well as the book regarding Hilly's bathroom initiative. 
(http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/the-help-skeeter/images/32260170/title/tell-er-skeeter-photo)

     I admire Skeeter because she refuses to publish Hilly's initiative. There is no doubt that every white woman in Jackson adores Hilly and go along with everything she says. There is never any arguing with Hilly or her opinions. Despite the way Hilly feels about the help, Skeeter has never felt this way, especially about her maid as she was growing up, Constantine. 

As the book goes on, Skeeter gets a job writing cleaning articles for a newspaper as Ms. Myrna. Skeeter goes to her best friend, Elizabeth Leefolt's, maid, Aibileen. As she continues to meet with Aibileen about the column, she comes up with the idea to write a book about what it's like for the colored maids working for white families in Jackson. At first, Aibileen and the other maids including her best friend, Minny, are very reluctant to tell Skeeter their stories. They believe she is just like all the other white women and thinks she just wants to get them in trouble. The amount of danger all of them face telling their stories to Skeeter is enough to scare them away. Eventually she gets more than a dozen maids to tell their stories and the book ends up being published.


The book becomes nationwide news and it is hard to believe that Skeeter's idea actually led to something so important. She wanted to write this book for completely selfless reasons. She wanted the people in the country to understand how wrong it is to treat their help like they do, although some of the stories told were of how they were treated well. Skeeter did not just do it for the money, because she paid all the maids with the money that she had made from the book.

I find Skeeter a truly inspiring character because she does not just sit back and watch these maids being treated horribly and do nothing about it like everyone else. She takes initiative for a cause that she believes strongly in, despite the amount of danger that she could face if the people of Jackson actually find out that the book was really about their city, which they eventually do. 

The Kite Runner: Societal Impact on Literature

     The literature of each time period is definitely impacted a lot by society. Authors and publishers always have to keep in mind what society will be interested in so that they can make as much money as possible. In our time period, kids and teenagers are getting less and less interested in literature and authors must work a lot harder in order to write novels that will interest today’s youth. It is not necessarily easy to predict what books will sell. Some people like more realistic books and some people like fantasy books. Sometimes it is a shot in the dark whether society will show interest in a novel or not. http://www.preservearticles.com/201103284772/literature-and-society.html In this article,  literature is described as the mirror of society. Our society has a direct impact on literature and our society is always changing, therefore so is our literature.

     Many people become interested in books when they can find one that they personally relate to. If a novel has a plot or characters that are similar to them or experiences they have, they will be more likely to read it and be very interested in it.

     The Kite Runner became a best seller in the United States and was a number one New York Times best seller for more than 2 years according to http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Kite_Runner. This novel had a strong influence on society. My belief is that the reason it had such a large impact is because the author, Khaled Hosseini, did such a good job telling Amir's story and making the reader really connect with what went on in his life. It makes us realize how much differently people in other countries live. Persepolis is also a good example of this too because we learn all the things Marji had to deal with because of the revolution going on in her country.

     These novels were both very popular and reflect how literature changes due to our society. They are both very realistic and that helps connect the reader to the novels.

The Kite Runner: Coping with Uncontrollable Forces

The character Hassan in the Kite Runner has to go through many experiences that are out of his control and must adjust to deal with them. Amir and Baba were forced out of Afghanistan because it had become a war zone. They ended up moving to California where there lives changed completely. After living here for a while, Baba became very sick and eventually passes away. His father's death takes a huge toll on Amir. Baba was the only person that Amir had in his life after they had to leave Afghanistan. Although Amir and his father did not have the closest relationship as he was growing up, there is no doubt that he had a huge admiration and respect for his father. Losing anyone in your life is a hard thing to deal with and is something we have no control over.

Amir and his father, Baba

(http://www.hollywoodjesus.com/movieDetail.cfm/i/810BB061-C037-4183-6EB7B5E1D0B1BCCB)

One day, Amir receives a phone call from his father's old friend Rahim. Rahim updates Amir about everything that has been happening in Afghanistan. He asks Amir to come visit him in Afghanistan where he tells Amir about Hassan and he learns that since he left, his old friend has gotten married, had a child and unfortunately been killed. This is news that Amir takes very harshly because it makes him think of their childhood together. Amir and Hassan grew up together and even though they had grown apart after all the experiences they went through, Amir is still devastated by this news. On top of this, he learns that before Hassan and his wife passed away they had a child who is now in an orphanage and is in need of a parent. Amir isn't sure about taking his child in which I don't really understand because he and his wife, Soraya, had been trying to have a baby.

 

 However, this is not all the news Rahim Khan has. He also suggests the Hassan’s father, Ali, and his wife, Sanaubar, were not able to have children and that Hassan was actually Baba’s child. This would mean that the entire time Amir and Hassan grew up together, they were actually half-brothers and didn’t even know it. This makes Amir more apt to consider adopting the child because that would make him Amir’s nephew.

Unfortunately for Amir, this is not even all of the bad news. Rahim Khan, the man he has looked up to for so long, is ill as well and says that he will not make it through the summer. This takes a toll on Amir because Rahim has been like a father to him for his whole life. He treated him like a father should treat a son and encourage his dreams rather than be embarrassed of them, like Baba sometimes was.

Amir and Rahim Khan

(http://wodumedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/Zekiria-Ebrahimi-as-young-Amir-and-Shaun-Toub-as-Rahim-Khan-star-in-Marc-Forsters-The-Kite-Runner.-Photo-by-Phil-Bray.-Copyright-Motion-Picture-Artwork-Photos-2007-DREAMWORKS-LLC-and-KITE-RUNNER-HOLDINGS-LLC.-All-Right-20-960x640.jpg)

 

 

This is a lot of bad information that Amir receives in a very short amount of time. All of these things are out of his control and he has already lost two people he had been close to for a long time and now he knows that he will lose Rahim Khan as well. Baba, Hassan and Rahim were the people that Amir was the closest to in his life and now he is forced to cope with these tragedies.

 

The Kite Runner: Innocence of Childhood

In the novel The Kite Runner, like Persepolis, children are put into situations and are forced to deal with them that no child should ever have to do. Childhood is supposed to be about innocence, not having to deal with responsibilities, and being care-free about the world because as soon as you grow up, all of that goes away and if you don't live your childhood to the fullest then you will regret it as you become older. 

Amir and Hassan are two children in this book that go through traumatic experiences forcing them out of their childhood and into adulthood way before it should have happened. Hassan went through the horrible experience of being raped and Amir was there to witness it. I could never imagine any child having to go through this but I can definitely see how these experiences pushed them right out of their childhood. If this event did not happen, Amir and Hassan would have continued on in their innocence and spend their childhood kite running like any other child in Afghanistan should be doing. 

Image of a child in Afghanistan kite running

(http://www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=46678)

Unfortunately for Hassan, his childhood ended after a traumatic experience he had that would never have happened if he wasn't just trying to be a good friend to Amir. If he had never offered to run that kite for Amir, he never would have been raped by Assef. This whole situation was extremely overwhelming for Hassan and also Amir who had watched it happen and was incapable of doing anything to stop it. This experience is one that no person should ever have to go through, especially a child. I can't imagine how horrifying something like this would be for a child, not really understanding exactly what's going on just knowing that it shouldn't be happening, and not being able to do anything to stop it. It is completely understandable that this experience would push a child closer to adulthood and away from their innocence. 

Persepolis: Book vs. Film 

After reading Persepolis and watching the film I gained a lot of understanding of Marji's story. In the book, we learn about Marji's grandmother but I don't think that the book makes her out to be as important to the story and Marji as the movie does. The film really brings the grandmother's character to life a lot more and we can see how important she is to Marji. The way Marji talks about her grandmother and the little things she does, like putting jasmine in her bra every morning, really shows the audience how much Marji looks up to her. 

The grandmother's facial expressions and her tone when talking to Marji in the film gives a better sense of how important these two characters are to each other. Marji is always asking her grandmother's opinion of things and you can tell that she searches for approval from her. You would think that with Marji's age that her grandmother would talk to her like the child that she is but she is much more straightforward with Marji and talks to her about the revolution without trying to hide things from her or make it seem like it is something that it's not. 

In the book you can still tell that Marji's grandmother is important but in the movie you really gain a sense of how close their relationship is and how much they mean to each other. 

When does childhood end?

     The answer to this question varies a lot because it is not the same for every person. Many people say that childhood ends at the age of 12 but I do not necessarily believe this is true. I think it is based on the responsibility you have and experiences that you have gone through. Many people are still children at 16, 18, 21 or even much later on in their life. It all depends. I read an article on BBC News that said that more than 2/3 of a group that was asked this question believed that childhood ends by 12. I am 18 years old and I would still not call myself an adult. Yes, I have a job and I have responsibilities but I do not act like an adult and I don't have bills to pay or a family to feed. I would not say that I have any more responsibilities than the average teenager does. Childhood is an extremely important time in a child's life because they have a lot of freedom and not many cares in the world. Childhood is what develops us into the people that we will become. Often you hear children complaining about how they wish they were older but I think that children should embrace their childhoods because there will not be another time is their life where they are as worry-free and stress-free as they are as kids. 

BBC News Article: http://www.bbc.com/news/education-21670962

     In the book Persepolis, by Marjane Satrapi a little girl named Marji is growing up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution and has to go through experiences that the average 10 year old girl would never have to go through during their life. She experiences war, protesting and committing violent acts. A great example of this would be shown on page 76. 

This is one of the comics in the book when Marji decides that she wants to join a protest and help to defend her family and friends. This is not the kind of activity that a child should be dealing with, Marji is forced to grow up way too fast in my opinion because of the situations she is dealing with where she lives. If she had been growing up in Iran during a different time I'm sure she would have had a much more normal childhood but because the revolution is going on she has to deal with things that no child should have to. Marji shows a knowledge that is rarely seen in kids her age. She knows a lot more than any other 10 year old girl would about the world, war and even God. I feel bad for Marji because she does not get to have the experiences and the worry-free life that the majority of the kids in the world have. 

Discussion of Exemplary Blogs: Unit 1 

http://costaricatravelblog.com

    Costa Rica is one of many different places that I would like to visit when I am older. I came across a blog completely dedicated to the sights and sounds of Costa Rica. This blog essential tells you everything there is to know about traveling to Costa Rica. She includes many different posts about the culture, things to do, when to travel there, places to eat and even airport information if you ever want to go there. 

     I think this blog author did a good job of setting up this page about Costa Rica. The blog is only one page but includes many links leading you to everything there is to know about this place. This blog is very colorful and enjoyable to look at. I like how she doesn't include all of this information on one page and you do not have to continuously scroll down to find what you would like to know about. If you are interested in learning about one specific thing about Costa Rica you are able to go through the menu and choose the post that has to do with what you want to know. Pictures are included in just about every post which helps to catch the reader's attention and keep them interested. A lot of the blog posts are relatively long but I think this is okay because you do not have to scroll past all of this to get to the information you are interested in, you can just go back and skip to a different post without doing as much work. 

     All of her posts are very interesting and give accurate information about everything having to do with Costa Rica. She includes just about everything you could possibly want to know if you are planning a trip to Costa Rica and even if you are not planning a trip it is still very interesting to learn about. She also includes a lot of her experiences in Costa Rica which is really cool to see and learn about especially if this country is one that is of particular interest to you. I think this blog author did an excellent job getting down all of the information about Costa Rica without making it so overwhelming for people to have to read every single thing.