[RP] Music.

I found this on Lina’s blog about the evolution and changes in music:

This makes me think... What is music going to be like in the future? I don't think it can get any worse that what we have now. I guess for those of us who still truly enjoy the classics can steer the next generation into the better direction.

I do think about things like this sometimes. Would people in the 1950’s or 1960’s even begin to suspect what sort of songs would soar to the top ten’s in the current music world (although I’m not sure they had top song charts back then, let’s make believe).

Lina states above that music these days is getting to be pretty bad, and fears for the futures. I agree, some of today’s music is horrible and raunchy and many songs even put down women. But I think that there are still some very classy new singles still being released.

Not along ago, maybe a week or so, my free post was on some lyrics of a Jason Mraz. As a singer and songwriter, I believe that his words are still so natural and pure. They don’t degrade people, say extremely profane language or become gross or dirty. They bring up issues in the world and talk about falling in love and sailing across oceans. The classics are always going to be great, but there is definitely some good new music being released today.

[CE] Typhoon.

Recently, a typhoon hit the Philippines. They have counted many missing and many dead, and there are still many more to find. They fear the death tool may rise even further. Many shelters are also now being occupied by people left homeless or that evacuated at the first signs of the disaster. It feels like there have been a lot of attacks that have affected a certain country many times. One of the main ones is Japan, who was hit by the huge earthquake early in the spring and is still experiencing after shocks. A bit of the same thing is happening to the Philippines:

Nesat is the seventh storm that has affected the country since May, and all of these storms have affected the north island of Luzon.

Aere, Songda, Sarika, Haima, Nock-ten and Nanmadol have all brought torrential rains to the island, many of which have triggered widespread flooding and landslides. Nock-ten was particularly devastating, claiming the lives of over 30 people.

I find these tragedies have been horrifying. There have just been so many that it really makes you wonder and worry about the world. Personally, I can’t even imagine what it would be like for the U.S or us here in California or the Bay Area to affected with something of this magnitude. Would other people chip in or help us out? Or would they think that the United States is already too well off for us to need any help for our problems?

[RP] The SAT

Have you ever thought about the SAT. Like, REALLY thought about it? In my opinion, I find it quite stupid. And not just because I’m the one who has to take it, but because I feel like it really doesn’t test anything about how smart you are. The SAT is a bit like a mind game, and reading into what the greatest possibility for an answer could be. The directions specify to look for the “best” answer, because it might not necessarily be the correct perfect answer. One of the “myths” listed on the back of my study prep book says that the SAT does in fact test intelligence and if you take “rigorous school courses” then you will be extremely ready for the SAT. However, I have taken quite a few advanced classes in the past two years and my first set of scores were far from impressive. (Most of the reason for me posting this is that I have to retake the test tomorrow.)

So after a first attempt, I decided that I needed a tutor to help improve my scores. And though it was my tutor’s job and how he made money, he even said that he believed the SAT was a stupid test and would gladly give up his job to make kids have to take the test. I find that to be quite interesting that he felt so passionately that way.

But I’m glad us teenagers aren’t the only ones that think this is a stupid test. I don’t find that it should be required anymore. Many schools took away the necessity of needing two SAT 2 scores, so why can’t they do the same thing with the SAT as well?

[Column] College Essay One

For years, working to help the environment has been a part of my life. The best example is my mom, who will carry around a soda can all day until she located a recycling bin. It has almost become second nature for me to preach environmental conservation, especially starting with environmental science this year. The simple fact that the Oakland Zoo in Oakland, California combined that and my love animals was perfect. Now, I have been volunteering at the Oakland Zoo Camp for 2-3 weeks each summer for the past four years. Every year, every week I go back, I am just as fascinated with the facts about animals and figures of environmental conservation as the kids I help out are. The Zoo and their words on conservation of not only the environment but the animals as well have heavily inspired me to want to be a part of that movement someday.

And not only has the zoo taught me the logistics of conservation, but other places as well. More and more as I have gotten older, normal family homes, my schools, restaurants, Alameda (my home town) in general, have adapted environmentally friendly ways of living with proper recycling and compost. I find this an accomplishment considering when I travel to different states, the environment concern seems lower than what I have grown up with.

Although being a teen assistant at this particular summer camp mostly involved me helping out with younger children for the benefit of the main teacher, there were still many behind the scenes activities that I got to participate in. One time that stands out most amongst the rest was a year ago when I got the privilege of feeding the giraffes. The Oakland Zoo is very private and does not give basic daily visitors the chance to pay to do things like this, so the opportunity was fantastic. The simple interaction between the animals and me really stood out to me and made me realize that maybe this is something that I might really want to do.

When I was in Kindergarten, I was always asked the basic question: “What do you want to be when you grow up, Anna?” Of course the answer changed every single time. One year, I wanted to be a doctor, then a nurse, then a singer or an actor. The answer fluxuated so frequently and nothing seemed to stick. But each year I signed up for the volunteering in the summer and set foot in the zoo again, it became extremely evident that working with animals and the conservation of the earth was the one thing I always came back to wanted to do in the future. I have spent over 300 hours of volunteered time there, and I’m already anxious to return. 

[FP] Oh, the Internet

Before I start, I just want to say that I am not trying to bash anybody that uses these sites (don’t worry, I do too) on a regular basis, just discuss a few things I have noticed.

The other day, I was talking to my friend about the benefits and downfalls of having a facebook. One of the biggest downfalls that we discovered was finding out information through facebook and not directly from the person who is posting it. My friend told me a story of a friend who had gotten tickets to a concert with her friend, and then proceeding to find out through facebook that the other girl had chosen to go to the concert with somebody else. It just surprised me so much that somebody did not have the courage to say something that simple to somebody’s face and have them find out through a PUBLIC SITE some private information.

I think the biggest point is that it has a huge affect on relationships between people. People will talk about “that girl that posted that thing on facebook, can you believe her?” It can make people think different of you, whether that is a good thing. Sometimes, I find it to be a strange way of bragging about everything you are doing at any minute of the day. But let’s be honest, how many of those “friends” do you actually know?

There are definitely positives, don’t get me wrong. I frequently use facebook to communicate with people about homework for a certain class or something funny that happened at school that I can’t text or call them about. Facebook can be useful, but it does change the relations among peers.

[RP] Some Things to Do

There have been quite a few posts about things people are hoping to do before they die, so this is kind of a collective response post to all of those lists.

There are so many things that I really want to do in my life before I die: my bucket list is fairly long. But here are a few specific things in detail.

I think the first one is to travel. The main place is Europe. I want to see France, England, and Switzerland: I just want to take a big, long trip out there and see many of the touristy sites out there. However, my main interest in places to travel is Costa Rica. Next summer, I will have completed four years of Spanish and practicing speaking there would be awesome. Another draw is all the outdoor activities there. One planned trip I saw involved kayaking, one of my favorite sporting activities.  

Another thing, and this is super random and just popped into my head, is trying fasting. Yeah know, people don’t eat or drink anything until around 5 o’clock. I think that would be interesting to try and take a look into those strange bits of other people’s cultures.

Every year during the summer, I always hear about the weekend long Avon Walk for Breast Cancer. Now this one is very dear to my heart because my grandmother died before I was born from breast cancer and when I was around 8 years old, my mom was also diagnosed. My mom has actually done the walk before, but I’ve always been interested in attempting it for my family and to see if I can do it myself.

Well, those are the main ones that I can think of right now!

[CE] Japan

This article looks at the recent typhoon that hit Japan.

It's amazing how much trouble natural disasters are causing this country lately. The one most will remember is that extremely intense earthquake that shook the country in early spring. The devastation was extreme: many buildings destroyed, people homeless, many dead. The earthquake also sparked issues with radiation that began to affect the water and food available. But thankfully, they were not alone. The whole world was in deep sympathy for the troubles Japan was facing, and large donations were given to help those in need.

And now, must recently, a flood has happened. The article says:

The typhoon comes six months after a devastating earthquake and tsunami killed thousands and sparked a crisis at the Fukushima nuclear plant, where workers were reinforcing the facility against the storm.

The flood is causing warnings to evacuate and there is even an example of water flooding all the way up to just below many bridges that are located from northern to southern Japan. Heavy rains are still affecting much of central Japan.

I am horrified by all the trauma that the Japanese people must be feeling in this first half a year. First, they are shaken, quite literally, by an 8-point-something earthquake that destroys huge parts of their entire country. Then, the issue of radiation affecting the health of people that were able to survive the earthquake was brought up. And now, after trying to recover after the difficulty of their spring, they have to deal with the issue of a flood and typhoon warning in parts of the country. I hope that they can deal with these problems soon and that the rest of the world will continue to help them.

[FP] Some Lyrics

So this is quite random, but for my free post this week, I want to look at the lyrics to my favorite song called Love for a Child by Jason Mraz, one of my favorite singers.


The lyrics are here, in case you are curious. Oh and I in no way am saying this is what the lyrics actually mean, just my interpretation of them.


Although this song was a very slow and calming melody, I find the lyrics a lot heavier and deeper in meaning than the beats may lead you to believe. The song  (remember, in my opinion) is about the writer’s experiences and relations with his parents as a child. It starts off with introducing the corrupt world that he has witnessed. He’s wondering aloud why all of this happens: the insane drinking, the drugs at young ages. This segues into his discussion of his parents divorce and how messy it all seemed. The divorce seems like it has a lot of benefits-no parents checking your grades is awesome! 

But in the long run, the tone is almost sarcastic. That may not be the perfect word to use, but it gets the point across. Who wouldn’t want everything that he has that came with the divorce? He HIMSELF doesn’t want any of this. So the title is essentially trying to say a little something like this: out of all this madness of divorce and everything that happened to his with his parents as a kid, he hopes that everything they did was out of love for him. And this is to be spread further that just Mraz’s own life, but to any who listen to the song. Don’t be the parents that he had, and watch what you do.

[RP] Our Master Class

This is essentially a response to our class’s master class the other day as well as the objective and what really played out. From Mr. Sutherland’s blog:

The plan now is to de-emphasize anything in my teaching practice that takes away from time I can be spending coaching my students directly on their writing projects. This is tricky with 170 kids or so, but with the right tools it is doable. For '11-'12, I want to define the measure of my success as the proportion of time I spend giving direct feedback on student writing.

I don’t want to start off with anybody thinking I’m going to trash the idea or say it was a horrible attempt to get advice. I feel like the introduction to this post made it seem this way, when really, I believe it was and is still a great idea. When Mr. Sutherland brought it up, I was scared by the idea even though the thought of getting that help from him seemed wonderful. It also made me laugh too. I mean, we all posted our college essays on our blogs where everybody could already read them, so why couldn’t we just read them aloud? People are going to read them anyways! But despite knowing this, the idea of going up there in front of the class made me nervous. I once did an SAT practice test where one of the critical reading passages described how beneficial reading your own work aloud can be. You know what you wrote, but reading aloud to others helps to identify mistakes more clearly and even want to perfect your writing knowing that others can see what you’ve done. Yeah, just a thought I suppose.

[CE] Social Media

Since the first computer, the use of this new technology has grown rapidly over time. One specific reason for this use is the access to social media. People like to interact, keep in touch, and share a few details about what they are doing and where they are. What better way is there to do this than be able to put it up on the Internet for friends to see? The video above explores Brazil and its rapidly growing use of the Internet. They even use an example of a prison being taken down and remodeled as a community center where visitors will have access to a whole floor filled with free Internet sources. This availability to social networking and other sites has caused a huge growth in online users and accounts made for these specific websites. 

And who is leading the way? The Brazilians are. Their twitter accounts are numerous throughout the area, amounting to 75 million, and 23% of these users are frequently updating their accounts. In the past six or so months alone, the amount of facebook accounts has increased for 10 million users to 23 million. That’s one big jump! I think that this use of the accounts is insane, but not necessarily a bad thing. I feel like sometimes the work “facebook” can carry a bad reputation with it sometime. But really, I’ve used facebook not to just simply let my specified friends know where I am, but to ask questions pertaining to school, or even find out some important world news.  This boom in social media could be a positive thing, informing people what’s going on in and outside of their communities.

[Column] College Essay Draft (UC prompt 2)

I have never really been the player of what one might call a typical “team sport”. I gave soccer a hearty try at around age five and quickly followed that by taking up softball. To put it simply, neither of those turned out to be my some of my greater successes. But amidst my difficulties in these two activities, I discovered dance, a pastime that I was able to stick with which made me feel accomplished and helped me grow as a person on and off the dance floor. However, I will not say that my first encounters with dance were a breeze or that I willingly packed up my things for my first class. Quite the contrary, in fact: I was stubborn, and decided it was in my best interest to wear a pink nightgown to my first class which was maybe not one of my better ideas.

But I made it to that second class, and so began my life as a dancer. My other two sports slowly faded out of my life as I kept up with the one activity I knew I wanted to progress with, the one that stuck. Every year, I felt as though I was spending more and more time at the studio, doing all the begging and persuading in the world to have my mother sign me up for just one more class. Dancing became my way to express myself and let out steam from a hard day. It became a release.

It was not just the dancing that drew me to Dance Arts Project studio every week, it was the atmosphere: the people, the teachers, the music, the laughter, the lessons, and the dance as well. I learned so much more than just a simple tondue or plié. I learned that it is conviction and dedication that shapes dancing, not necessarily how much talent one is born with. The level of acceptance helped me to expand my own personal views to encompass that love of dance does not just come with a personality type, but can be taken up by anybody with a love of movement.

These realizations did not come so easy though. Once I got into the higher levels of dance, I had to look at dance class as a responsibility, as it strayed farther from simply being a leisurely activity. I was older and became a role model to the younger kids, which was much harder for me than some of the others my age. I had to take on a role of leadership to ensure fun and equality at the studio. Soon, I will be able to be a member of a new addition to my studio this year: a dance council. My role in this head leadership of the studio will to plan fun events, create a code of conduct, and make sure that all the dancers feel as though they can express themselves through dance without being judged by any of their fellow classmates.

This ability to have the freedom of dance, feel as though I have a second home and even take on a role of leadership has helped me to discover who I am on and off the stage. I am so proud to say that ten years of dancing has made me more accepting, strengthened my leadership skills and my dancing as well. I could not be happier with my choice to be a dancer.

[Response Post] High School

This little excerpt from Kristen’s blog really made me think about High School so far and the beginning of this part of my life’s end.

It's crazy how fast these years has been. We came to AHS not knowing anything about high school and then experienced our high school football games during Friday nights, finally having off campus lunch, representing our class during Homecoming, meeting new people, attending all the school events, and watching the Seniors leave every year... and finally, this year is our year.

I must say, I don’t necessarily remember the first day as a freshman, but the entirety of my freshman year still stands out as one of the highlights of my life. There were some people I’d spent years with already, some new faces, new teachers, different classes, the excitement of exploring every single off campus lunch option: everything was just so exciting. And of course, there was less homework. A positive in everybody's mind I believe. I think Kristen sums up all the key points of the new aspects of the high school journey very well. We finally got a class name. Not just ninth grade, but freshman. At that point, where we are now seemed almost impossible to grasp. I almost feel like the thought of me becoming a senior would never even happen, it just seemed so far away. Now that it’s finally here, senior year is finally here, it’s time for me to figure out what I’m doing this year, figure out what I’m doing next year, and then try and map out the rest of my life. Heavy words, but very true. We’re growing up.

[Free Post] Hi There.

So for my first “pick your own” post, I want to get a little into who I am. I know, I know, we ARE working on college essays which essentially do the same thing. However, those essays are almost just for the sole purpose of bragging to an anonymous reader about phenomenal things you’ve done in the past to get into a school full of smarties. I’m not trying to boast like that here.

Back to the topic at hand, my name is Anna, just in case you missed that key bit of information. I like to dance and have since I was around seven years old. Nobody said I was a professional-and I’m certainly not-but I do it because it makes me happy and who doesn’t want to be happy? It’s the only “sport”, you could say, that I’m not complete rubbish at. Nothing is thrown at me in dance, so that’s always a plus.

My favorite subject is math. Whether that’s because I’ve been blessed with classes full of great people, an awesome teacher or I just like the content, I’m not sure yet. Despite my age, I still have trouble grasping really far reached subjects that require a lot of abstract thinking. I’m a very concrete thinker. I find this is probably one of the reasons that math is my favorite subject: There is normally one solid answer.

I can be very, well, outspoken. If I have a strong viewpoint or opinion on something, it will probably be heard and I won’t back down until I convince somebody that I’m right. I like to say what I think and whether that gets me in trouble or not, it is inevitably a part of who I am. I can be loud. I can be quiet. But I’ll fight for what I think is right.

And last but not least, my favorite book (this IS an English class) is Water for Elephants. Who DOESN’T love a good circus love story?

[Current Events] The Economy

It is a known fact that unemployment has hit an extremely high percentage. Many will even go as far as to compare it to the days of the Great Depression of the 1930s. In this video, this issue is addressed by focusing on the economy and the very high unemployment rate. On Labor day in Detroit, Michigan, Obama announced that he does in fact have a plan to help and try to rebuild the economy back to its former glory. On Thursday, the president will be addressing Congress and the nation to explain a new plan to help piece the economy back together and get more Americans jobs as soon as possible. 

However, he did not give many clues as to what this plan is and tries to persuade listeners to flip on their television Thursday night. Many believe that Obama’s reelection is very dependent on his getting the economy back in order. Some of the people interviewed believe that the problems are not getting fixed simply because of ongoing arguments within Congress and that the economy is at an extremely low point because of this. Others seem to have more faith in Obama by saying that he was thrown into this mess and should not be to blame for it. However, they are very unhappy with his many past attempts and failures at making the economy thrive once more and are skeptical of this big new plan to be announced in the near future.


EDIT (small edition): Upon a small request, I just wanted to add a quick bit about my opinion on the issue. I think that Obama is being blamed for quite a bit that he was not originally responsible for, but the United States is in a crisis right now and I think if things don't start moving again soon, there will be some serious consequences.