Exhibition Night Reflection

Overall exhibition night was great. For my humanities portion everyone that came to my table ended up learning a little bit more on Chinese history. For the physics portion I gave everyone an idea of what was going on in that project.

One of my strengths was knowing my content. I felt really comfortable explaining my content to anyone who was interested. One of my weaknesses was being organized. When explaining my lab I sometimes couldn’t find what I was looking for in my binder. This was because the binder was a little disorganized.

One of the most difficult interactions was one I had with someone who pretty much knew about the history of China. It seemed like they were testing me on certain events in Chinese history and current issues. I knew my stuff so it was easy but it was still the most difficult interaction of the night.

If I could exhibit my work once again I would make sure my binders for both classes are more organized. This would allow me to be more efficient when it comes to referring to a certain lab.

Character Biographies

Zhi-Min-Gang is a giant panda living in china. He is a young adult at age 40 (all the pandas age differently in this story). He is quite slim for a panda his age weighing only 200 pounds. His height when standing is 5’11” which is around the average height. Zhi is very intelligent and is known to sometimes over think things. He is cautious and even paranoid at times. His personality comes from years of oppression and major government movements against the people through out his young life. He often tries to forget his past and have fun but cannot due to the current state of government. He strives to make a change around him but often lacks the strength to oppose his foes.

Pang-Xiong-Mao is Zhi’s best friend. He is a giant panda of age 39. He is short and fat being only 5’ 5” and weighing about 300 pounds. Pang and Zhi went to school together and since then they were inseparable. Many people consider him stupid. He is very carefree and always tries to have fun. Pang isn’t afraid of anybody which sometimes gets him into fights. His personality often gets him in trouble. He always tries to cheer Zhi up when he is down. Pang also has a thing for female pandas something Zhi could care less about. His goal in life is to go to as many parties as he can before he dies. He isn’t really aware of what’s going on around him and is quite self centered.

Story Synopsis

It was another gloomy morning in china and Zhi was walking amongst hundreds of other pandas towards work. The year was 2025 and it was just another year in a worthless life with no progression towards fame or success. As he walked he saw another panda dead on the street. This raised the count to three since Monday. He walked on checking his lifetech device. It was 7:30 in the morning he was going to be late again. He met up with his friend Pang. They talked for a while and Zhi left him to continue his journey to work. He got there 35.7 seconds late. There was a big scene and he was fired.

Pang and Zhi went to the bar to try to loosen the mood. Pang was talking to the ladies but Zhi wasn’t interested. Instead he drank and remembered the past. He remembers a time ages ago in 1911 when Sun Yat Sen led a revolution against imperialist china. Pang and Zhi go on a journey to seek other jobs and to try to cope with life and their current government. They encounter many problems but they manage to proceed. As the story progresses Zhi reveals more of his past life. It seems like the friendship of these two characters is the only thing worth living for and the only thing that was significant in each others lives. As they move on Pang’s courage and Zhi’s intelligence seem to be the only thing that can oppose the government. Zhi and Pang are tired of their government and how it deals with their population. They hear about a protest. One that they say will be bigger than Tiananmen Square in 1989. Zhi and Pang both decide to be part of it in order to make a difference.

In the afternoon they left for Imperial City a newly founded city that was the center of government activity and the ideal place for a protest. As they took a ground transport to the city they doubted themselves and what they were about to do. When they got to the city the protest began with everybody chanting. Soon the military got there and used full force on the somewhat peaceful protestors. It turned into complete disaster in a matter of seconds. A wave of pandas fleeing from military separated the two friends. What used to be the center of a protest was now a full scale war. The military was killing everyone that seemed to be opposing them. Small military bomber jets were dropping bombs over giant groups of pandas. He saw Pang lying on the ground unconscious a distance away. A military official got in his way and blocked him. Using force he beat Zhi to the floor. Seeing his friend in trouble made him want to help him desperately. He knocked over the guard and as he ran toward Pang a bomb dropped and everything went black.

He wakes up in the hospital along with his friend Pang. They are both wounded really badly and will be in the hospital for weeks. As they watch the screentech they saw how other countries were reacting to this event. The U.N. put sanctions on Chinas military and the change began to grow.
Overall Zhi made a difference. He was proud of the fact that he finally did something brave to help a friend. He learned from his experiences and he learned to forget his past and move on.

Persepolis Reflection

In class we read the book Persepolis. This book represents the story of the Iranian revolution and the Iran-Iraq war through the eyes of a young girl named Marjane Satrapi. Her youthful innocence was a great contrast to the horrible things going on around her.

This book is very historical as key events are shown throughout the life of this young girl. The first major event discussed in Persepolis was the Iranian revolution. This was significant because it eventually led to the first theocracy in the world. At the time Marji was only nine and didn’t really understand what was going on. She didn’t know the difference between a religious and secular government and went along with the changes the government made.

As she grew older her surroundings changed. Iran and Iraq were now at war. They were destroying each other’s towns and bombing each other’s oil reservoirs. As this was happening Marji was becoming more decadent in a sense that she rebelled against the government and anyone who had authority over her. The reason she did this is because she saw all the terrible things the government was doing. The government sent out young proletariat boys to fight in the war. The government told them they would become martyrs and move on to the next life. The young boys not knowing any better found this to be a veritable reason to fight. As the government committed more of these treacheries Marji became more rebellious. Her life became more clandestine as she did more things against the government. Finally her family couldn’t take it and realized that Marji’s future in Iran looked very grim. Her parents decided to send her to Vienna. The book ends as she is leaving the country.

I think that Marji’s experience in Vienna will be a significant one. She will become very educated and learn about why the war in Iran started and the details of the actual war. I think that she will one day visit Iran again when the war has ended and see her friend and family. The most important thing she will do is record her story and write Persepolis so that many people across the globe can see what she went through.

Overall the book Persepolis was great. It had a great amount of historical context but at the same time was very entertaining. I liked how the book was written and how Marji’s life was shown through an array of artistic pictures. I found it amazing how the pictures and the words combined showed different types of emotion when needed. I think this book can give me key insight when it comes time for me to create my own graphic novel.

Lowering The Voting Age Seminar Reflection

Overall I think that the seminar we had today was good. What it lacked was the amount of preparation leading up to the seminar. As a result of many people annotating last minute the conversation got off to a rocky start. As the conversation got going more people got passionately involved in the heated conversation which led to a great learning experience. As a group I think we should have controlled the conversation better in order to give others a chance to speak and stop one person from dominating.

I think that the text was sort of bias since it empowers sixteen year olds and lists off all the rights the should have. I think that some of the ideas proposed in this text were very good but definitely had some flaws. For example it talked about how a teens should vote by passing a civics test. As a seminar we explored this idea and realized that it wasn't the best idea. I think the text really helped us argue and explore the whole concept of voting at sixteen.

I think a lot of my fellow students said something crucial during the discussion. Zac Wendroff mentioned how the civics test would be unfair if it was only given to sixteen year olds and would only work if given to everyone who wants to vote. It is this phrase that made me think of another viewpoint to this crucial issue.

Is this the year of the youth vote?

That is the question that seems to be crucial for the next presidential candidate. Will the youth finally take onto themselves their own suffrage to elect a leader? Will the youth voter turnout finally yield progressive results for this country?

I feel like this year is the year of the youth vote. I think this is true because of one man in the democratic coalition. Barack Obama seems to be the single candidate that has all the youth votes. I see Obama as an outlet for the youth to fight against the rule of two families in the white house for the past twelve years. I think that all the youth is fed up with the rule of the presidents that have controlled this country the majority of their lives. He is a fresh face and the youth are ready to support their candidate with all their power. I feel like the youth neither worry if hes too liberal or too conservative. I think all they want to do is free themselves from Bush's overpowering almost evangelical reign. Barack Obama is someone that radiates change from the way he speaks and addresses the people.

Overall I think this year will be the year of the vote. The constituent youth will definitely go out and support their candidates in order to let their voice be heard. I think this year will be when the youth will make an impact in society and the history of this country.

The Race for Presidency

The research process for me was very interesting. I liked learning about a real candidate that could very well be the next president of the United States. John McCain was an interesting guy as far as his background goes. I liked this process because the topic of economy was one that was interesting to me. Although it wasn’t one of the more heated topics I would say the state of the economy is something that’s in the balance and something that has to be changed by our future president.

What I found out was something I think most Americans want to hear. John McCain feels like he needs to reduce government spending in order to lower taxes. To me this is good news because like many Americans I feel like the government is overspending.

I agree with McCain’s plans for the economy but I do not like his views on other issues like border security. I feel like illegal immigrants should be treated more fairly.

Now that I have gone through the research process I am very interested in the presidential candidates. Some of the issues that interest me are border security and Iraq. These issues interest me because I feel like they will affect my life thee most in the next few years. I feel like I need to be a part of this democracy and system. By being a part of this democracy I want to change our country and overall change the future of the world.