May Current Events

1. Israel Soldiers killed 10 on Gaza aid convoy

In International waters, about 70 miles out of Israeli's boundaries, Israeli soldiers stormed a flotilla of ships that were intended for Palestinians in Gaza, and there were 10 left dead because of it. Israel said it was defending themselves, but not only Palestinians, but many other countries around the world thought it was barbaric of Israel and unnecessary, and a lot of countries are taking direct action because of it.

I think this has a lot of world importance because Israel has gone through so much, even before it was a state, and now they are taking means to protect themselves a little to far. With other countries beginning to notice how hostile Israel is getting, they are doing more things to "try and stop it". Other countries are able to do this, however, the United States has a very strong tie with Israel, so we would have to support them in whatever route they end up going down.

2. Gunmen killed 5 at Pakistani Hospital

Four gunmen opened fire on a Pakistani Hospital on Monday. They opened fire because they were hoping to attempt to either kidnap or kill the suspect in last weeks attack on a religious minority. The shooting left 12 dead, and 4 police officers and a security guard also when police went back to examine the scene.

This has global importance because this is just one example of how people respond to violence with violence. If the world is ever going to have global peace, then people can not respond back in violence when a violent act is committed upon them.

3. North Korea will meet "War With War"

After South Korea had an anti-submarine exercise early on Thursday, North Korea responded by saying "they would meet confrontation with confrontation and war with all-out war". The state-ran news agency broadcasts that the South Korean leaders are "a group of traitors" and they will experience "unheard of disastrous consequences" if they misunderstand North Korea's will.

This has global importance because the hostility between North & South Korea has always been very extreme. But as the threats are getting more and more serious, and North Korea will soon be able to carry them out, the war that breaks out between them will launch the United States and other allies of South Korea to join in, as well as Iran being North Korea's main ally. That wouldn't be good, as it would lead to a possible WWIII.

Berlin Conference Effects On Africa

I think that the main effects that the Berlin Conference had on Africa was the splitting and dividing of African people and culture, and the slavery and segregation that is still seen today. When all different countries took over different parts of land, it split people apart from their fellow tribes / families, and in a way destroyed a lot of African culture. In many parts of Africa today, people talk french or english. Even though that can be viewed in a positive way, that isn't the way that it was suppose to be. The slavery and segregation is one of the harsher and more everlasting effects. When the white men came to Africa and claimed their territories, they also claimed the people in those territories as well, and made them work and treat them as inferiors. Then when they took Africans over to make them work in America, that made the situation double and hints of racism are still seen a lot over the world, and unfortunately to say, the United States as well.

Scramble For Africa

When i look at the quote, I think of countries "scrambling", or all racing to get the most control over Africa first. Everybody is so eager to split up Africa and take it all for themselves, they don't realize what they are doing to the people who are living their and their culture.

African Folklore

Rainforest Folklore

The summary of "The Spirit" is how a boy goes into the forest to capture an elephant for his dying people. He succeeds, brings it back to his village, but then is still hungry, so goes back to his trap and waits. A little boy though gets stuck in the trap, because he ran far ahead of his mother. The boy ate him, and went back to his village and told his uncles of his good luck. Then you hear screams from the forest, (little boys mom), and the men of the village grabs their guns and goes into the forest and kills her.

I don't really know much about African myth to know what was incorporating in the story; but this whole story was mention spirits a lot, hence the title. It talked about how the boys spirit carried him into the trap, and how forest spirits are dangerous.

I don't think anything was entertaining about the myth, I didn't like it.

I could apply it to my own life by incorporating it with the idea that people are only out for themselves, and to stay close to your parents.

April Current Events

1. Continous attacks on school students in China.

For the past month, there have been many reports of violent acts against elementary school students. Last friday, a man attacked a pre-school and violently hit 5 kids with a hammer, before setting himself on fire. They were all hospitalized, but had no life-threatening conditions. The day before that, over 28 kindergarden children were hurt after being attacked by a knife. Three of the children were killed in this incident. A few days before that, a man attacked 18 children in primary school. Police have suspects for all of these incidents, and two of them were recently executed for their actions.

This doesn't have much global significance, but hearing about these things just make me sick to my stomach. I don't see how people in the world can have no sympathy towards others and especially children who have the rest of their lives ahead of them. The man who attacked the 28 children claimed that he did it because of, "failures in his romantic life". Some people are just sick, and I don't think that the world will ever be able to get along if there are people like this still around in the world, doing these vicious things to harmless students.

2. Rescuing girls from sex slavery

This article was about a girl named Geeta who was sent to a brothel in India when she was 9 years old. She was in there for 7 years before a rescue team came in and saved her. In those brothels, she would be verbally abused, have to sleep with any of the men that came through the door, and exploit herself everyday. Her family was tricked into sending her away, by thinking that she was getting a good job that would support them. 10's of thousands of girls are trafficked like this every year. The families are tricked by sometimes people that they know and never see their girls ever again.

This is a huge issue going on in the world. Although this article only talks about the brothels in India, it is happening all over the world. People don't treat others as equal people, just things that they can sell off and make money off of them, and then get rid of them when they aren't wanted anymore. This affects so many families every year, and it is something that no family should ever have to go through. I think that people all around the world should help and try to stop these abuses and torture towards girls.

3. Oil spill in gulf is worse than thought

Gov officials have come out and said that the Oil spill that occurred in the Gulf Of Mexico is five times worse than they have predicted. Coast Guards have concluded that oil is leaking at the rate of 5,000 barrels a day; not 1,000 as they initially thought. They have set up many "in situ burns", which will prevent the oil from spreading any further.

This is important for a couple reasons. First being that we are losing gallons and gallons of oil each day in the gulf, which is paid for our economy because it will raise the price of oil, and we will need to buy even more from OPEC to make up for this loss then we already are doing. Second, the ocean life that lives in the Gulf, which is known to be some of the prettiest coral reefs in the world, are being destroyed slowly, along killing the animals that are living within them. The fresh seafood that we get from the gulf, and all of the other natural resources are slowly being ruined, and this will have a major impact on our economy when we are in need of some of these resources.

Wonders Of Africa

1. Pyramids of Giza

I didn't realize that not only there are historical pyramids in Africa, but I didn't know that it was the highest structure in the world until skyscrapers were created. When I thought of Africa I thought of tribal things and wood huts and stuff like that, nothing like great pyramids.

2. Vodou Religion

I thought it was crazy how everywhere in the world I have seen it spelled as "voodoo", when really that isn't a spelling for it. I wonder how the west got those ideas of using dolls or placing hex's, when that isn't what the religion is about at all. It seems like the west has been making fun of the practice, because we always pretend to "possess" people and not take those things seriously, where as in this religion it is a very big deal.

3. Mosque of Djenne

It's sad how myself and tons of other people don't know what kind of history and architecture Africa has. This castle-like mosque was the center of the town square for centuries. I didn't realize that Africa had ever had these kind of cities, and it lets me see the potential it has to modernize itself and become a prospering nation.

Africa - 4/29

When I first think of Africa, I think of jungle. In cartoons Africa is the place that has all of the animals and plant life. It doesn't have many mountains, and can be considered a vast plateau. I also think of a lot of terrorist and bad leadership as well. There are many terrorists who are stationed there, and end up taking control of a country's government because they rise up and become stronger than the government. I always think of the movie Blood Diamond, and that I think that is a pretty large issue still going on in Africa today. A lot of these things aren't a good way to consider Africa, because they do have many good natural resources for the world, but these are what our media portray to us and what we hear about a lot.