Life of Pi: Chapters 1 - 10

1. Pi told us about his profession and studies in zoology.
2. Pi described a skinny man who lives in Scarborough.
3. Pi told us what he likes and about his favorite uncle Mamji who likes swimming pools. Pi was named after a swimming pool.
4. Pi told us about the zoo that used to be by his house on the way to school.
5. Pi told us how he changed his name to Pi.
6. Pi told us more about the skinny man from Scarborough. He is a good cook of all sorts of dishes, ranging from Mexico and other countries.
7. Pi told us what visitors at the zoo did to disturb the animals like Goliath the elephant seal who died of internal bleeding because someone threw a broken beer bottle into the exhibit and he ate it.
8. Pi's father explained how dangerous the animals are; he told a story about a tiger eating a ghost.
9. Pi explained the aftermath of the lesson he learned--how everyone was feeling afterwards and he estimated how long it would take for these feelings to go away.
10. Pi explained the stories of the animals that escaped from the zoo, for example, the snow leopard survived a winter before it was caught.

Videos

I wanted to congratulate the winners for the 4 best videos. I particularly liked one scene in a video that didn't win. Their Flash was a citizen spraying pesticide onto the plants and I think it was really well done. I think they might have made the video a little bit better on the interview, but the rest of the video was really great. In Chris Connell's group, I really liked how they did the interviews and how they found different people who reacted differently to the same question. It pointed out that people have different feedback on the same question and you can get many points of view about what people think about illegal immigrants. I was disappointed because I didn't get to see my own video at school because it was shown in the morning when I wasn't in class. I hope everyone liked it. Spencer said we all did a really great job on the project.

Life of Pi

I'm going to start reading the Life of Pi. It sounds like an interesting book. I've seen it in Josh's office before and I've wondered what it is about. I'm wondering what kind of story it is and what the lessons are from it. I'm wondering if it's about the number Pi or if it's related to that at all (I doubt it). I'm really excited to read the book.

I think the latest addition to my DP is very interesting. I think it adds a lot to my DP and makes it look much more professional. I think our team did a good job on the video. I provided some of the images and I edited some of the script and Ryan and Gino did most of the work putting the video together. I had a good time on this project.

Tradition

Today we did a writing warm up on tradition. I wrote about what we traditionally do at Thanksgiving each year. Every Thanksgiving we have a play; although each year the play is different. I learend something from doing this warm-up: that it is good to keep information about what you do. I have lost some of the ideas we used in our plays and some of them were very funny. For example one year my brother slid down our staircase using a rope. That was one of the best stunts we did. I've learned that over the years the older you get that sometimes the less creative people get. That's what I've learned through our Thanksgiving plays because my brother and his friend no longer want to participate and a lot of it is left up to me which is okay because I love doing them. I just wish my brother would help more often because I think the plays were better when he helped out.

Presentation Board

The presentation board for our group project is going to have information on why migrants have an economic dependency on America. I found one thing that is very interesting--that illegal and legal immigrants and the stuff they buy in the US makes US citizens sometimes not be able to get the resources they need. The illegal and legal immigrants sometimes take things the US people need. This is also helped by George Bush's failure to make marketing improvements that would have raised a lot of money. This is just one of the items we will put on our poster board. I am also going to cover why migrant workers might be coming into our state. Mostly they come because the state they live in can't support them so they decide to come to the US, either legally or illegally.

Group Work

I'm not getting along very well with my group for our documentary, but I try to ask them for help but they can't help me. So then I go to Spencer and then I'm able to find a job. I don't really find that a good example of teamwork because group members are supposed to be able to help each other. They shouldn't have to have the teacher help them with everything. So I figured out why we're having this problem. I think it's because of me. Lately I've been irresponsible and I want to apologize to Spencer and my teammates for that. I'm going to finish this project with the help of my team. We are going to get an A. I'm going to work on the poster board over Thanksgiving break and by the end of the break, it will be done.

Movie versions of the books I've read this semester

I wanted to compare the movie versions to the books I read this semester. I watched Jaws and The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Jaws was very similar to the book, but there were a few things they forgot. For example, Chief Brody's wife secretly datead Hooper in the book. ALso the shark died differently in the movie. In the book the shark died from wounds and in the movie it was blown up. Quinn died differently also. He was not eaten by the shark in the book. Hooper also didn't die in the book. He survived in the cage.

In The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy, the movie was very accurate and the storyline was pretty accurate, but the timeline was different. A few things in the movie never happened in the book. One character had 2 heads in the book, but only 1 head in the movie. Also different characters did things in the movie than who did it in the book. Also, Trillion was not Arthur's date in the book. She was Ford's date.

I liked the movie Jaws better than Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy. The comedy in the Hitchiker's book was much better and I liked imagining the characters in the book better than seeing them in the movie.

Latin American Leaders

After having read about Batista and Allende, I really don't want to live in Latin America. It seems like a very, very sad place to be. It seems really strict, very harsh. I can't even imagine myself being there. It's terrible what has happened in their governments. It's awful how many people were tortured and killed. I would really much rather just be here in America because our government isn't as strict. We have more freedoms. It is similar in a way because there are criminals, but America seems like a lot better country from what I've heard.

Trip to Baja

Our Mexico trip was a lot of fun. We went to a school and I entertained some children with my Chinese yoyo. I haven't felt such joy since I did the yoyo at the Fern Street Circus. We also played on some sand dunes. There was this extremely good memory I have when Adrian did a pump flip over Chris. We didn't do much field research, but we were in goods. We cooked our own food and played games. We collected water samples. We roasted marshmallows and we had a lot of fun. We also collected shells. I found 42 sand dollars in total and I remember finding a dead dolphin when I went on a walk with my dad and Josh.

Trip to Baja Expectations

I expect to go fishing with Josh and I hope to catch a fish. I'm hoping to catch a dorado. In terms of the school work, I'm not sure what we will be doing. I'm excited about it because it's going to be a big surprise. I'm just going to go along with what everyone else does and I hope to have a good time. I imagine we might be eating Mexican food and I know we are going to be camping. I'm hoping that Austin Harbert will change his mind and come on the trip because I think it would be good to have him with us.

So far on our film, I need to ask my group about that more because we need to make more progress.

I want to talk about what I am going to be writing about. I asked one very interesting question: why were the people under the rule of this political leader tortured after he tried to help them with a crisis? Spencer said this was a very good question and so I've been thinking about. Why would people want to torture each other. The crisis was not that great. So what I've decided to do is to write a paper on why people torture each other during war, during daily life or any time at all. It's not right to torture other living things, not in any kind of evil way or even a joke kind of way (although that might be alright).