Category: Uncategorized

Perspective of Mom

I rushed up the stairs after work, trebling with adrenaline. At work I had heard that pictures of people wearing bourgeois gowns were considered fourolds, and I imagined a search party tearing through the photo albums of Xi-reng’s landlord family. I quietly treaded to where Xi-reng and Grandma were cooking diner. Whispering to them my thoughts, they agreed we had to do something. “We could throw them away,” Grandma offered.

“No, they could be found too easily,” Xi-reng commented, “But burning them would work. We could do that after diner if the kids go outside.” We agreed on that plan, and I began steaming the rice.

After diner, I asked Ji-li to go outside with her siblings. “We have something to take care of,” I told her. She reluctantly agreed, but I could tell she knew it had something to do with the Cultural Revolution. I wish she could understand that I was keeping her safe by not telling her. Xi-reng and I immediately went to work. He would tear out the fourolds memories, and I burnt them in a washbowl, watching them dissolve into ashes. The room quickly filled with a thick smoke, but we could not open the window very wide in case the neighbors saw the smoke pushing its way out. After a few minutes and many memories gone, we heard a knock at the door. I opened it a crack as to not let the smoke, and Ji-li and Ji-yun crawled in. They observed the situation, looking at the routine.

“Mom, this one doesn’t have long gowns or anything. Can’t we keep it?” Ji-yun asked pleadingly, gesturing to a picture that Ji-li had picked up.

“The Red Guards might say that only a rich child could ride a camel. And besides, Grandma is wearing a fur coat.” I replied hopelessly. The fire enveloped the memory, erasing the ink into a pile of ash. With that, we finished and I flushed the ashes down the toilet.

No one slept that night.

Deal or No Deal: Blog Reflection

In the game “Deal or No Deal” probability plays a large role in helping the contestant decide whether or not to take the money offered to them by the banker. The contestant can use the probability that they will win $1,000,000 to assist them in their decision. For us, our briefcase contained the $1,000,000 prize, so sticking with it until the end was the best option. I was quite confident that we had the winning prize because I chose the briefcase that made us win. Besides probability, I think the general ideals of a person effect how they play this game. For example, some people would rather have some money than none, and would rather not take that chance. Other people follow the “Go Big or Go Home” idea and always shoot for the $1,000,000. I like that idea. Since it costs nothing to go on the show, I say shoot for maximum prize, and if you don’t get it you still didn’t lose anything.

The Wave

300px-Great_Wave_off_Kanagawa2

We Came to fish,

Nothing more.

To make a living,

We are poor.

 

Now we wait,

The storm must pass.

We must make it,

For the rest of our class.

 

Families are waiting,

Relying on us.

Fish to sell,

Prices to discuss.

 

We Came to fish,

Nothing more.

To make a living,

We are poor.

 

I wrote an Ekphrastic poem based on the Wave print by Hokusai. The speakers of the poem are the poor fishermen who went into the ocean as they always did, but encountered a perilous storm. They wait for the storm to pass while their families wait for them to return. My A B C B rhyming pattern gives repetition to the poem, and in part symbolizes the repetitiveness of the fishermen’s lives.

53 Stations of the Tokaido Road

Shimada on the Tokaido Road (number 24) reminds me of when Seikei and the Kabuki Troupe crossed the Rokugo River because in both scenes everyone has to be ferried across each river. Seikei said that one of the boatmen(who were ferrying people across the river)’s ancestors had saved Tokugawa Ieyasu, and as thanks Ieyasu had promised that the boatmen’s descendants would always be able to ferry people across the river, so a bridge was never built. In the picture there is no bridge either.

In the picture of Shimada there are not very many ferries, although many people are lined up to cross. From this I can infer that this would have been a bottle neck where travelers would have to wait a long time to continue making major progress to their destination. I can also infer that, even if each ferry ride is not very expensive, the sheer number of them would provide any boatmen and their families enough to sustain themselves. There is what looks like a permanent settlement next to the river where the boatmen would live with their families. There is a lot of variety between what all of the passengers are carrying, which shows that all members of every class would travel at least once in their lifetime.

Renga Poem

Can you smell the cold?

The trees are leafless, without life

preparing for snow                                                                 AL

Frost hits my face, a warning

The wind picks up, ever strong                                            AC

In the fog of fall,

when the grass is frosted over,

a cold-front appears.                                                             AL

Touring 18th Century Edo

I find the seki interesting because it is a very clear example of the Shogun’s power and control over Japan in the eighteenth century. It shows how effective the Shogun’s method for snuffing out crime in Japan is. It also shows me what the different classes are. The samurai were the ruling class that kept order in society. Then the farmers provided food, but mostly stayed in one place but provided food for everyone. The artisans and craftsmen who made goods. Then the lowest class are the merchants and shopkeepers, which sometimes transport goods from one part of the country to another. The merchants would have to be pulled to the side to pay a tax for their goods and to have their big bags checked.

3D Object Information

For the Flatland Project I chose to make an Igloo. Igloos are commonly made of ice in extreme places- namely the Artic, Antarctic, Scandinavia, northern Russia, or northern North America. The Word Igloo, or Iglu, simply means house. They were built as temporary houses by Eskimos and Traders to keep warm, while away from permanent structures during hunting season. They are designed to block out wind and retain heat, and because of this are best with a small tunnel connecting the house to the outdoors and no extra space (with extra space you have to heat more air). I chose to do an igloo because it is fairly simple, but has an interesting background and stereotype and, for its purpose, is slightly ingenious. I was also brainstorming for what to do as I trudged through the ice that coated my hill, which brought on ideas.

Encyclopedia Britannica, Editors. “Igloo | Dwelling.” Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica, n.d. Web. 01 Feb. 2016. <http://www.britannica.com/topic/igloo>.

Flatland Movie

Flatland the movie was an educational tale of a revolt from tyranny. It started with explaining the hierarchy of shapes within Flatland, and as they were showing that they showed most of the Flatland community. As the real story began to unfold, one of the main characters, Arthur Square, kept having strange dreams. In his most important dream, Arthur (and consequently the viewer) was shown the secret of the third dimension that the Circle tyrants were hiding. After he woke up and went to work, he found out that his curious grand-daughter, Hex, had ventured into the forbidden area 33h to find an answer to her idea of 3 dimensions. He rushes off to save her, but in the process is captured by the circles. During his public trial, he tells the secret to the entire community, and a revolution begins. Throughout the story I mainly learned about all of the dimensions, starting with a single point.

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