Clothing styles in India: Blog Eight

Since we have just finished reading the fantastic novel Nectar In a Sieve, I thought it would be appropriate to learn a little bit more about how the Indian's dress. Indian's dress quite different from our culture. People in India wear mostly cotton clothing and a spectacular fact is that India was the first place where cotton was ever grown! The traditional clothes the women wear are the sari or the salwar kameez. A sari is like a strip of unstitched cloth that can range up to nine meters and it is draped over the body and many different styles. The salwar kameez is another quite popular dress for women. It is made up of loose trousers and matched with a long loose shirt. This phenomenal dress originates from the Muslim invaders from Turkey and Afghanistan. For quite a while it was considered a "Muslim dress" but now it has become much more popular all across India, and many other South Asian countries. On the other hand, for men the traditional clothes are the Dhoti, Lungi or Kurta. A sherwani is usually worn for special occasions. Something in common with men and women is sometimes men also wear salwar kameez, which is usually a plain white cotton, and top the kameez with a dark waistcoat. The lungi is a type of wrap- around garment and is worn all over India. It is traditionally worn with loose- fitting paijama. Today many of the Indian styles have been modernized. A lot of the western fashion has common among Indian men. A common look is horizontal stripes and plaids, and also casual business shirts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clothing_in_India

http://www.indianchild.com/indian_fashion.htm

Blog Seven: Change

I read an article about a girl named Nadya Suleman's and she just had octuplets. She is from southern California and nearly two weeks ago she gave birth by Caesarean section to six boys and two girls on January 26 in the Kaiser Permanente Bellflower Medical Center, in California, USA. She is now the mother of 14 children and is definitely going to be expecting change in her life. This article was mainly about how her life is going to change drastically once she finally gets to bring here precious babies home. This is only the second case ever of eight children being born alive. Nadya Suleman already has six other children. She says she hated growing up lonely being the only child and it was her dream to have a large family. Many people have been accusing her of having all these kids for the money be claims that she just love kids. Another thing that caught my attention was how her other six children are all under the age of seven, and don’t yet realize how different their lives are going to be once these eight babies come home. Bringing home eight babies at once is one big responsibly and Nadya is going to have a whole new lifestyle. 

Blog Six: Having Hope Leads To Saving 155 Lives

In People Magazine there is a very inspirational and motivating article about a man, Capt. Chelsley "Sully" Sullenberger III. He was the captain of US Airways Flight 1549 that phenomenally landed on the Hudson River. All 155 passengers and crew got out of the plane alive. There was a passenger Steve O'Brien who recalls seeing Sullenberger calm and in control in a raft and knew that he was a rescuer. When things went bad he knew what to do and handled the situation very well because he had hope and knew that mainly without his help and the crews that they could have lost passengers. But Sullenberger kept strong and fought his best to keep each and every person alive. All the passengers were relying on him to survive and needed his passion, hope, and strength to get through this horrific accident. Sullenberger was a hero to these people, he saved their lives and became a huge icon and many people respected him for what he did. He was invited to the Super Bowl in Tampa, and he also was invited to visit Washington for the Inauguration, where he met Barack Obama. Although there were a few people upset about the whole situation Sullenbereger kept his head strong and knew that he did the best he could do, but he still does look back at the situation to see if there was something he could have done better. On the positive side this accident had changed many peoples lives and passengers had incredible things to say about this day and how Sullenberger changed their lives. Captain Sullenberger is still overwhelmed by the situation but still wants to be a pilot. Being a pilot was his dream since he was five years old. Saving 155 peoples lives is a big deal, with all the hope and devotion Sullenberger had, he has become one respected inspirational man.


http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20258824,00.html
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/02/08/60minutes/main4783580.shtml

Blog Five- Culture/Religion

Since we are reading a book that reflects on the Indian culture, I thought it would make sense to get a little more background information about the Indian and culture and its religion. Hinduism is one of India's main cultures, next to Buddhism. Something that really stood out to me in the Hinduism culture was marriage. In Hinduism the marriage is sacred. Traditionally Hindu parents look for the right person for their son/daughter, which is called and arranged marriage. Commonly, the parents use an astrological chart at the time of birth of their son/daughter to find a match with the help of a priest. They say the two souls come together and marry because their karmas are intertwined. For the actual wedding usually they are very costly and most of the time parents pay for the wedding. A lot of the time the wedding is mostly red and gold. Typically middle to upper class weddings have a guest list of over 500 people. They have a live band playing and there is a lot of dancing. Dancing is common just before coming to the wedding venue. Many rituals are performed at the weddings and the families and friends bless the couple. At times the wedding celebration can take up to one week depending on the practice in that different part of India.
Once married it is not necessary that their gender roles are going to stay the same forever. Sometimes they may switch roles, the husband becomes the wife and the wife becomes the husband. For a Hindu woman marriage marks the end of her life as a maiden. She has to leave her parent's house to begin her new life with her husband. Once she is married her relationship with her parents remains formal and minimal.

http://www.hinduwebsite.com/hinduism/h_marriage.asp

Gender Roles - Blog Four

Today I read an article about gender roles. This article was very eye opening and was about something I had never thought of before. More schools want dads to be role models. They want dads to be more proactive at elementary schools and come and help with parties and eat lunch with their kinds and even have their photos posted on the walls. Usually when we think about theses things you always think of the moms not the dads. Normally, you see moms volunteer to help with school activities, parties, events, or just helping the teacher. Not very often do you see dads helping out. Many schools want changes and want dads to start being role models for their kids. A school that is very eager to welcome dads to their school is Anoka School. In Minnesota this school is one out of five and 1,000 in 32 states that participate in this program. They have created a name for this, which is Watch DOGS, which stands for (Dads Of Great Students). What the dads do is they take a day off a day of work and spend the day with their children at school and help out the teachers. At a lot of elementary schools the majority of the staff are women. At one school all of the classroom teachers are women except for 21 classrooms. This may just create a huge change in schools. When people think about volunteers at school immediately people think moms. Elementary schools are wanting dads to be role models too and maybe that may have a positive effect on the students.

The Article...

http://www.startribune.com/local/south/38783792.html?elr=KArksUUUU

Culture... Blog Three

Today I read an article about Youth Day in Cameroon, Africa and today, February eleventh is the day of their celebration. It is a day of celebration for the youth and it also a day for them to share their creative skills. Youth day is a trade- fair and they have a march down, 20 May Boulevard in Yaounde street. The march is very important to the children because on the sides of the roads their parents are standing and cheering for the them filled with happiness. The kids prepare weeks in advance and put all their effort into making this day perfect. During this festive holiday many people like to show some crafts that they have made as in sewing and netting. The main goal of this day is to encourage creativity amongst the youths. Also a main goal is they want to inspire and motivate a new generation of youth. This is very different from our culture in America because we do not have days for the youth. Although, we do have different ways in inspiring the youth. This is a really big day for a lot of adolescents in Cameroon because this is their day and it definitely makes them feel very special. This celebration is supposed to help youth in so many ways, be motivated to learn, have fun with others, learn new things, and share great ideas and stories. Youth Day is also showing the kids their importance to the community. As well its' a day all the youth look forward to because it gives them power and shows them they matter. So much effort is made to help the children and by the end of the day, each and every child has learned something new and is proud of who they are. 

A video of the children marching.

More about Youth Day...

http://yermanincameroon.blogspot.com/2008/02/national-youth-day.html

http://www.iansa.org/regions/cafrica/youth-day-cameroon.htm

http://allafrica.com/stories/200902100601.html

In the Time of the Butterflies... Blog Two

Last week in Spanish class we watched a movie called "In Time of the Butterflies." One of the main issues in the movie was the main character Minerva going through many struggles to fight for the independence of women and her freedom. The current dictator at that time was Rafael Trujillo and he was a horrible dictator. At the beginning of the movie Minerva respected Trujillo because he was the dictator but throughout the movie Minerva realizes how horrible of a person he is. Many times she stood up to him and by doing that she lost her father (he was assassinated). Women weren't aloud to go to law school but Minerva was not going to accept that. She went to many extents and finally made a deal with Trujillo to let her go and she won. Trujillo was sneaky though when it came time for her to graduate law school he would no give her, her certificate. He said that was never apart of the plan. Still Minerva never gave up. She wanted for women to be treated fairly and was not going to let Trujillo stop her. She created a group with some people from the law school to get back at Trujillo. They never did succeeded because Trujillo over powered her. But Minerva never gave up. From the beginning of the movie until the end she tried her best to get back everything that Trujillo had taken away and tried her best to make everything work out. Minerva fought for her freedom until her very last breath. At the end of the movie Minerva and her two sisters were assassinated. That day was November 25th, which is a date, celebrated internationally as the independence for women. They were called Las Mariposas. 

Click here to know more about Las Mariposas and the movie

http://www.celluloidfilmreview.com/images/In_The_Time_of_the_Butterflies.JPG

Heat Wave in Southern Australia... Blog One

In the second largest city in Australia, Melbourne, Australia the temperature is phenomenally high. Last Friday it was recorded that the temperature reached above 109 degrees Fahrenheit for the first time since 1855 (since record-keeping began). Many people are going homeless and some even have died. The wildfires destroyed more than 20 homes and there are thousands who have lost power. About six people died from heat stress. South Australian State authorities have said that the heat had probably caused some of the recent 22 sudden deaths. They are using heavy air conditioners but that caused a breakdown in the cities electricity grid which caused 500,000 homes and business to lose power. This is creating a disaster and ambulance services have reported increases in emergency calls because of the heat. Many people are suffering and dying because of all this heat and  the city is being destroyed. Hopefully this natural disaster will end soon. 

http://www.startribune.com/world/38694302.html?elr=KArksUUUU

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-as-australia-heat-wave,0,6024066.story