Book Review 2: The General in His Labyrinth

People like writing about things they feel comfortable talking about. Either if it is because they know a lot about what they are talking about, or they understand it really well or if it is some other reason, they write really good things. This is  why Gabriel Garcia Marquez decided to write The General in His Labyrinth.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez was born in Colombia. As a kid, Gabriel Garcia Marquez went through many struggles. He had to deal with death, and also moving a lot from place to place.  After he was born, his father became a pharmacist and in order to make money to support his family he had to move to Sucre, Bolivia to work as a pharmacist, but he took his wife with him to work in Sucre because it would have been really hard for him to make enough money to support his family. They left Marquez with his grandparents. Marquez grew up with his grandparents and knew them more than he knew his own parents. His grandfather was the one who started teaching Marquez how to read and to write, which eventually became Marquez's favorite thing to do. He told Marquez stories which made Marquez think deeply shaping his mind as a thinker and as a writer. Marquez's biggest struggle as a kid (when he was nine) was the death of his grandfather. That changed his whole life permanently and he ended up moving with his parents to Sucre,  Bolivia where his father owned a pharmacy after having lived nine years with his grandparents.  In Sucre, Bolivia he continued with his writing and eventually he realized he wanted to be a journalist.

He went to the University of Cartagena where his career as a journalist began. Marquez really liked to write about historic events and stories based in real experiences or events. One of the people he really wanted to write about was about Simon Bolivar. He read an unfinished book by his friend who was a writer Alvaro Mutis, which was about Simon Bolivar's last voyage. The story took place in Magdalena River, Colombia. Marquez felt really interested about the book and the story for two reasons: because he wanted to write about Simon Bolivar and because as a kid, he grew up living by the Magdalena River. He knew a lot about the setting so he asked permission to Mutis to take his idea and to write about Simon Bolivar and his last voyage in the Magdalena River, Colombia. That is how he ended up writing the book The General in His Labyrinth. He felt connected to the story because he knew about some of the characters and he knew the place. That made his book even better because he actually knew what exactly he was talking about.

  Had Bolivar not existed, Mr. Garcia Marquez would have had to invent him. Seldom has there been a more fitting match between author and subject. Mr. Garcia Marquez wades into his flamboyant, often improbable and ultimately tragic material with enormous gusto, heaping detail upon sensuous detail, alternating grace with horror, perfume with the stench of corruption, the elegant language of public ceremony with the vulgarity of private moments, the rationalistic clarity of Bolivar's thought with the malarial intensity of his emotions, but tracing always the main compulsion that drives his protagonist: the longing for an independent and unified South America. This, according to Bolivar himself, is the clue to all his contradictions. -The New York Times:Book Review

It is like Gracia makes up his own stories. Stories that are real he can make them seem like he wrote them. That is how good his writing is. 

Book Review: The General in His Labyrinth

Simon Bolivar was an important figure in South America that changed the way people thought about independence. Bolivar was born in Venezuela in 1783 and died in 1830. He was known as "El Liberador" in Spanish, which translates to, The Liberator. He was one man who really made it possible for Latin America to become independent. It was mostly in South America though. He liberated Most of South America from the Spanish Empire. Then he became president of several countries in South America. He was one great leader who is always remembered, but when we really think about him, we are not sure what things he had to do or go through to give so much for his people. Some people may wonder what his life was like, or what it was like to set people free. What was it like to be him and to do the things he did?

Well, Colombian writer, Gabriel Garcia Marquez writes about Simon Bolivar's life in his book The General in His Labyrinth. Simon Bolivar is the main character in this book. At the beginning of the book, in the first chapter, Simon Bolivar is introduced as an unhealthy man. He is 46 years old and he is preparing to go on a journey to Europe, but his sickness does not leave him alone making things hard for him. During his voyage, which takes weeks, to Europe, he is really sick. One of the reasons he wanted to leave The Americas was because in his own land, people he, himself liberated started to turn against him. Some wanted to kill him because they did not like him as a leader after the Spanish left. So that is why he wanted to leave.

They accused him of wanting to be president for life so he could appoint an European prince as his successor. They accused him of pretending to travel abroad when in reality he was going to the Venezuelan border and planned to return at the head of the insurgent troops in order to seize power, (p.13).

This shows what the people in Colombia thought the reason he wanted to leave. In reality, he did not want any of that that the people thought.  Bolivar was hated by people, but loved when was setting them free. People betrayed him. Him being sick just made it easier for people not to recognize him as a hero. His sickness and illness just made him seem weak. That is how people saw him.

I don't think many people now know what this Latin American hero went through. All the hate, and the negativity. They only see him as an idol and i am sure that no one thinks that part of his life was a struggle. That is the untold story that is left out. He is so important that a country was named after him; the nation of Bolivia. Now that i know more about him, and his life, i start to think about all the sacrifices he made, and that thanks to him the world is now different.

Connections in Family Stories

Some of the stories my classmates wrote were about tragedies. In fact, mine was about a tragedy,  but sometimes the events and tragedies that happen can change people's lives. In my story, my grandfather was mistreated during the Honduras-El Salvador war in 1969. He was mistreated for being from El Salvador and living in Honduras. The soldiers from Honduras came to his house and took him to prison, where they tortured him and treated him bad. When he was let free, his life changed and he was not the same person. He became a sad person and his personality changed a lot.
I found other stories written by my classmates that were similar, or that had the same ideas that mine had.. I think that the stories that involve tragedies are the ones that connect to mine.

This is from Carly's story:

His leg had been cut off of circulation for too long, it was already dead. On that day, the doctors amputated my Uncle’s left leg at the age of twenty.
The loosing of his leg depressed and hurt my Uncle so deeply; he tried to commit suicide multiple times.

In Carly's story,  she talks about the story of her uncle who was traveling to "the city" in a train. Something happened to the train that caused it to go out of control so the people in the train thought that the best way to survive before the train crashed was to jump off from it. Well, Carly's uncle (which is actually her great-uncle) decided that he, with the other passengers would jump off the train, but it was too late. By the time he jumped off the train, the train had already crashed into a house of boulders. His left leg was jammed by the boulders. He survived, thankfully, but his left leg had to be amputated when he was only 20 years old.

After the accident he became really depressed and always thought about suicide. This incident changed his life for ever. Eventually he changed though; he did not think about suicide anymore and looked more happy. This was because all the support his family gave him. The strength that his family gave him helped him feel better about his life. This is the kind of tragedy that can put someone down, make them feel like giving  up, like Carly's uncle.

In Rahni's story, she says:

So they left the baby and came to California. They got settled in and were doing their thing, when my great grandmother got word that her baby Charles and her mother died in a burning house. they said the KKK was responsible for it but they did not know, so she had to go back and confirm it to make sure.

 In this story, her great grandparents get married but struggled so they move around a lot. They have a kid and they leave it with her mother, and then move again, but one day the baby and her mother(great grandma's mother) are killed in a fire. This was a tragedy that changed the lives of that family. Rahni's grandparents were hurt a lot because their kid was killed probably by the KKK, and her mother was killed as well. That caused suffering to the family.

Tragedies change people's lives and make them suffer. Sometimes the effects are permanent but sometimes people learn to let go and continue their lives normally, not forgetting about the past but putting it aside. I have actually done this in my life.

These three stories have tragedies that caused struggles. I guess that's all what tragedies do...

The cycle of daughters and mothers

Mothers influence their daughters to become like them when their daughters grow up, but they don't always do it directly. Sometimes they kind of force their daughters to do whatever they think their daughters should do, in other words, they make the decisions for their daughters so that when they are older, they are shaped similar to them.

In the short stories from The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan, The mothers in most of the stories treat their daughters in a very similar way. They make their daughters do things that they want them to do and not actually what the daughters want to do.

I think that this is a big part of the Chinese culture, and i also think that it could be part of other cultures around the world but the Chinese are the ones that show it the most.

In the story Rules of The Game, Waverly Jong is the daughter of a mother who tells her what to do, what is according to her what will make Waverly a successful person. Waverly learns by herself that she is good at something; playing chess. She slowly starts to show the people around her the big talent she has. Once her mother sees that her daughter is doing something with her life by herself, she interferes and starts pressuring her daughter to work harder on her chess skills, which just makes it hard for Waverly to be able to do good.

 As her men drew closer to my edge, i felt myself growing light. I rose up into the air and flew out the window. Higher and higher, above the alley, over the tops of tiled roofs, where i was gathered up by the wind and pushed up toward the night sky until everything below me disappeared and i was alone. (pg. 101)

Eventually, her mother caused Waverly to quit chess. Her mother was just trying to help her with her pushing, but Waverly could not take it. This mother was trying to make her daughter be what she wanted her to be and did not let her deal with her dream independently causing her to quit what she was so good at.

One of the main characters, Suyuan Woo who died from a brain aneurysm years after she moved from China and lived in the US. She created the Joy Luck Club, and she got a group of women to join her (They were Chinese too). After her death, the other women that formed part of the Joy Luck Club saw Jing-Mei Woo as the next leader of the group. They kind of expected her to continue what her mother had started.

'You are responsible', said my mother. (pg. 28)

This doesn't show how the women from the club wanted her to replace her m,other, but that does show how the mother, Suyuan, talked to Jing-Mei, telling her that she is responsible. This kind of shows that her mom considers her or could consider her responsible for whatever she leaves behind when she dies, in this case the club.

Mothers influence their daughters in life, they want them to turn out a certain way, but they pick the way they'll turn out and the daughters are dependent on doing things from their mothers.

My story: Once upon a time during The Football War

I remember my aunt told me this story years ago, when I was a little kid. I think I was seven when she told me. So to refresh my mind, I had to call my other aunt in Honduras to tell me more about the story, so she explained it to me and she told me some things  I do not remember my other aunt telling me, but that is probably because I was a kid. But anyways, this is the story:

Years ago, in 1969, Honduras and El Salvador had a war. It was called “The Football War”. The war started because El Salvadorian people were migrating north to Honduras illegally. The population in Honduras was growing and there were way too many people. Those were political conflicts between the two nations. At the beginning of the twentieth century, Salvadorans had begun migrating to Honduras in large numbers. By 1969, more than 300,000 Salvadorans were living in Honduras. These Salvadorans made up twenty percent of the peasant population of Honduras. Many illegal Salvadorians were taking the jobs of Honduran citizens and the government of Honduras did not like that. It is called The Football War because soccer was one of the things that contributed to it. Even though "Football War" implies that the conflict was due to a soccer game, the causes of the war go deeper.

The World Cup was going to happen the following year in Mexico, in 1970. Honduras and El Salvador met in the second North American qualifying round for the 1970 FIFA World Cup. There were three games for the qualification of the 1970 FIFA World Cup played between Honduras and El Salvador in 1969. One game was played in the capital city of Honduras, in Tegucigalpa and Honduras won that game. That game was controversial because after the game, an eight-year old Salvadorian little girl killed herself by shooting herself in the heart. The second game played in the capital city of El Salvador, San Salvador, was won by El Salvador and that created a lot of violence on both sides.  The last and most important game, which was played in Mexico, was also won by El Salvador by one goal with extra time. On the same day, 26 June 1969, El Salvador dissolved all ties with Honduras, stating that "the government of Honduras has not taken any effective measures to punish these crimes which constitute genocide, nor has it given assurances of indemnification or reparations for the damages caused to Salvadorans". This led to border clashes between the two nations.

More issues were territorial issues. El Salvador debated that part of what Hondurans said was their territory was actually Salvadorian territory, which was not true.

In the afternoon of July 14^th, 1969, military action began. El Salvador’s Air Force attacked targets inside Honduras, killing civilians. War was never declared, and El Salvador surprise attacked Honduras. Salvadorian troops entered Honduras, destroying towns and killing civilians. To defend itself, Honduras sent troops to face the Salvadorians and the Honduran Air Force to stop the Salvadorian Air Force.

My grandfather was from El Salvador. He was born there and lived there until he was five years old. At the age of five, he moved to Honduras, to a small town close to the border with El Salvador. I am not sure if my grandfather or “abuelito”, as I called him came to Honduras legally. Well, He lived most of his life in Honduras and I think that the only time he was in El Salvador was when he was a baby and maybe he visited once or twice as an adult but he was technically Honduran. I know that he was a citizen of Honduras because my aunt told me, but I am still not sure about him going legally to Honduras.

In 1969, when the war began, the Honduran government ordered the people of El Salvador to leave Honduran land. If not they would be taken by the Honduran troops and taken to prison.  What my grandfather did was hide.

My aunt says (she was a little kid during the war) that they could not sleep during the war because in the town they lived was really close to El Salvador. Every hour, they would hear planes flying over, dropping bombs close by. The Salvadorians were bombing every town they could. My grandmother, grandfather and my uncles and aunts would hide under their beds, afraid of the bombs, even though that was not the best place for protection, but that was the only thing they could do because they could not escape because there were Salvadorian soldiers everywhere.

A few days after the war began, Honduran troops pushed back the Salvadorian taking control over their towns and most of their territory again. Salvadorians still bombed the towns but not as before. Once the Soldiers from El Salvador were kicked out of the town where my grandfather lived, the Honduran soldiers went around the towns looking for Salvadorian people. My grandpa was in danger. The government had already told the Salvadorians to get out of Honduras.

The Honduran soldiers captured my grandfather, and put him in prison where they tortured him and many other Salvadorians found. They were hung on trees but not killed. They were not given food, and they were constantly hit by soldiers. We do not really know what my grandfather’s experience in prison was because he kept quiet when he came back. He did not say much about his experience. But I am sure it was not a good experience.

After the war ended, he was still in prison for two more months. He was freed after the two months and he was allowed to stay in Honduras since he was a citizen. In Honduras, things changed after the war. Salvadorian people were mistreated. My grandfather was mistreated by other men. He was insulted for being Salvadorian. Years after the war, Hondurans and El Salvador signed a peace treaty and after that, things started to get better for Salvadorians in Honduras.  

I learned that there were conflicts within my roots. This connects to me because when I was younger, I grew up with this mentality of having negative thoughts against Salvadorian people, but when I grew older, I started to understand that we are a family. I did not see that when I was little. I did not even know my grandfather was from El Salvador, and I found out years after of his death. I never got to spend much time with him. I have only one memory of him with me. I was too young to remember more about him. He died when I was three years old.  

I think that this story has survived in my family because that had never happened to anyone in my family before and has not happened to anyone since. My grandfather was also someone really important in my family, he was a role model.  It has been passed from generation to generations because we, in our family need to know what our struggles have been and to remember what happened. What makes this significant is that my grandfather survived, if he hadn’t been lucky, he would have been killed like many other Salvadorians did. And yeah, that is my story.

Mothers and their daughters

The story, "Rules of the game" from the book The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan relates to the article written by Amy Chua: "Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior". In Chua's piece, she focuses on telling the audience about what the lives of many Chinese children look like in comparison of those of, for example, western kids (Americans).
In Rules of the game, Waverly is a Chinese girl who has two brothers who are treated similarly to what Chua said kids in China are treated like. Chua focuses a lot on how the parents want their children to be successful in school in specific. In The Rules of the Game, Waverly's mother does not focus on her daughter's education though. One Christmas, Vincent, Waverly's brother  received a chess set from the church. Waverly became addicted to the idea of playing chess and when she learned how to play, she went started going out with people she didn't know and playing chess and as she did that, her sills improved.
One day, her mother realized that her daughter had a real talent; playing chess. So she signed her up for a tournament first and after she won that, she signed her up for more. She started as a local champion and ended up being a national champion. Her mother then became a real proud mother and this idea came to her, to only make her daughter practice chess and to forget about everything else. Her mother kind of forced her to improve, as she wanted her to because she wanted her daughter to keep winning so she could be proud and to kind of show off her daughter to others.

I went to school, then directly home to learn new chess secrets... But i found it difficult to concentrate at home. My mother had a habit of standing over me while i plotted out my games. I think she thought of herself as a protective ally. Her lips would be sealed tight, and after each move i made, a soft 'Hmmmmph' would scape from her mouth. 

Chua talks about a similar idea. The idea of education. Instead of education, Waverly's mother forces her to learn more chess than her studies. Its also like playing the piano and violin only.  This can be seen as one of those instruments.
I do think that Amy Tan's novel endorses Chua's arguments about motherhood.

Rebelling for a reason

Through out history, people have rebelled against their leaders for different reasons. In the last 5 years i have heard about some type of rebellion or revolution in different countries around the world. Right now, the revolution in Egypt is the one that has been most know to people around the world and The United States mainly.
The main connection that i see between what is happening in Egypt and what happened in George Orwell's Animal Farm is that here is only one kind of leader. In Egypt Mubarak has been the leader of the country more than anyone else ever has. He cheats to be the leader over and over and to never be removed out of power. That is not necessarily what happened in Animal Farm but i think that the same idea can be built. Animal Farm had different leaders, but the thing was that they were all pigs and it was never a horse or a donkey, or any other animal that formed part of the farm. I think that having one leader  for a really long time is almost the same as having different leaders that can or could be the same. Even though Major might not have been like Napoleon it was still unfair to have alike leaders having the control. I think that in Animal Farm it was an injustice just to let the pigs be leaders. It would be the same as if a man just like Mubarak became leader after Mubarak and after that man another one like him.
In other cases such as what happened in Honduras in the summer of 2009 also connect to Animal Farm. In Honduras, the ex-president Manuel Zelaya tried changing the constitution of the country so that he could do the same Mubarak did and be reelected  every time. He also took advantage of his power treating the people of the country unfairly. In animal farm, Napoleon and the pigs kept changing the constitution in their favor and also took advantage of their power by making all the animals work so they did not have to do anything.
Changing the rules is unfair, and when someone changes the rules against the people, the people respond by rebelling so that their voices are heard.

Should teenagers be allowed to vote?

Teenagers do not all act the same way or think the same way as each other. Some are mature and some have no idea what they are doing and do not care about the consequences.Sometimes there are teenagers that have the capacity to behave like a mature adult. I have personally met people my age who seem to have that adult mentality where everything is serious. I think that most teenagers have the capacity to act mature enough to vote. I think adults make generalizations about us. They see one of us doing something immature, and they think we are all like that, but that is also a generalization; not all adults think that about us. I think that teenagers should be allowed to vote.

Teenagers are a big part of the population in this country. I think that if teenagers could vote, the results of politics would be a little different. It is true that young teenagers are probably not ready for voting, which is something really important in society. Teenagers start to become more mature as they get older. My point is that the voting age should be lowered to sixteen. Even fifteen would be okay. 

For example, in ASTI, we start to see freshmen and sophomores think critically in their work about things that matter in the world such as family, college (higher education), environment, politics, etc. We put our own opinion, and a lot of times people (adults) are impressed by us. We are like young adults. Teenagers work, since we can start working at that age. As said in this article, some of us hold part-time jobs,
some drive, and pay taxes, and seventeen year old teens even serve in the army. The why can't those who work and pay taxes vote?

At schools, there are school governments with the same idea of a normal government, except that they are run by students. If teenagers can vote for something like that, then why wouldn't they be able to vote in real elections? Teenagers that are sixteen or older (maybe fifteen) should be able to vote. There should be some kind of requirements for teenagers, maybe a test or something that can prove that they are ready to vote. That would be a fair thing to do. 


After all, isn't a democracy "a government of the people, by the people, for the people", and aren't we people?

Into The Wild reflection

The first part (the first six chapters) of "Into The Wild" by Jon Krakauer was really interesting. I really liked the first part. Even though the story is true, sometimes it seems like the writes makes some stuff up or kind of exaggerates. I really like the way this author writes, but the book wasn't what I expected. I thought that since I knew it was a true story, that it would have been the actually person telling their story, in this case Alex. I think the book would be much better and more interesting if it was all written by the actual character. Much like a diary.
The story itself seems really good to me and is an adventure I would be interested on doing but not under his same circumstances. I think that his personality really goes with the kind of things he does and the way he sees life is a way different than any other human in the story.
I think that in this book, one of the major conflicts there is is society. Alex seems to have something with society; he isolates himself from it. He lives in his own society. Alex is the one who doesn't like the government and hates rules. He likes to be free and to do whatever he wants, that's why he goes on this adventure unto the wildness.
Another conflict in this book is himself. Not as much as society, but he has or seems to have problems with himself. It seems in the story like he is mentally ill. He might have mental issues and he seems to struggle with his life a little. Even though he enjoys living in the wild.
These are the kind of books I like reading because they are really interesting. The cool thing about books. That are based on true stories is that the events in the story actually happened. There is a feeling when I read and I know that what I am reading happened. I feel impressed sometimes, or sad. Depending on what it was I get different feelings. When I read something fictional or made up, and there are things that impress me, I realize that it didn't happen so I feel disappointed. With documentaries, it is different. That is why I like books like this one.
This book is really good in general. I like the way it flows and everything else, just that if it was written from the character's point of view, it would have been better.

Night Essay: Elie vs. Society.

Society has always had problems throughout history, and human inequality has been one of the biggest problems. In the book, "Night" by Elie Weisel, a Jewish comunnity is taken by nazis to concentration camps where they literally work to death. Elie, a Jewish teenager manages to survive due to his hope, patience and effort for living. Things like this wouldn't have happened though, if the nazis hadn't seen the Jewish as different from any other human group. The main conflict of the story is between Elie and his community, and the Nazis.

Nazis keep the Jews in the dark about what is happening to them. Elie lives in a peaceful ghetto among many other Jewish people and German officers who watch them. The nazis often do unexpected things that affect the Jewish communities' people. One day, the Jewish were informed something: "The guetto was to be completely wiped out. We were to leave street by street, starting the following day,"(11). The Nazis come to Elie's community and take them all to the concentration camp without them knowing. They have little time to do it, and if they make mistakes, it can cost them their lives. Due to acts like this by the Nazis, Elie and his community feel threatened. The Jewish never know what will happen to them next.

The Nazis feel no compassion for the Jews. All throughout the story, it is shown how the Nazis mistreat the Jews and disrespect them. The feeling of superiority and power is the reason the Nazis make the lives of the Jews miserable. Elie and his group marched from the concentration camp they were being evacuated from to another one and one of the SS soldiers leading them, yelled, " 'Faster, you filthy sons of bitches!' "(81). This is how the Nazis treat the Jews; in a very disrespectful way not caring about what they say. The SS soldiers want them to run as fast as they can just to purposely make them tired, so that if anyone stops, they can shoot them and kill them. Both, the nazis and the Jewish have different points of view on this occasion; to the Nazis, this is how they show their superiority and power and to the Jewish people, this is a competition for survival. As the hate on the Jews continues, society becomes more corrupt.

The Nazis try to encourage prisoners to let the weak ones down and to try to survive for themselves. Elie sacrifices his ration of food to let his father eat more than him so he can be able to survive. The only thing Elie wants is to keep his father alive to always have someone next to him, however, the Nazi head of the block said to Elie when he noticed Elie helping out his father survive, " 'Listen to me boy. Don't forget that you're in a concentration camp. Here every man has to fight for himself and not think of anyone else. Even of his father', "(105). The head of the block is telling Elie to let his father down and to look for himself. This strikes Elie's mind just like it does to the minds of many other Jews. Elie's care for his father won't let him down, but the Nazis divide the Jewish friends and family members from one another either psychologically by messing with their minds or physically by force. At the end, all the weak ones die and the strong ones continue their misery.

The major conflict is that the German Nazis destroy Elie's life just like they do to thousands of other Jews. They take their most important values; their freedom, their hope and their own people. Nazis aren't conpassive with the Jews and they wash their minds telling them to forget about everyone else. When te Nazis mistreat the Jews, chug their minds, and isolate them from society, they cause at least as much damage as their weapons and their gas chambers do.