I chose a senior project topic that I knew would engage and be enjoyable for the students. There is a large number of students at SLA who play soccer, but there isn’t a space where they can play when in the winter. So to see if they would be interested in having a futsal league or after-school club, I hosted a futsal event. Students from different grades and with mixed skill levels attended this event to play. After the event, I interviewed some of them, to ask if they would like to see more of these events in the future, as well as to know why they thought it would be a great idea to have a futsal team and give the SLA gym more uses then just normal indoor sports. They all seemed to have a positive attitude towards this idea and wanted to make it a club. I chose this project because I was part of the soccer team during my senior year, and noticed many of the students with amazing skills, as well as those starting. After the season came winter, many didn’t know or had access to indoor facilities to play, and practice. So I wanted to give them a place where they could practice, Futsal is a great version of soccer that allows players to improve their skills according to the environment that they are playing in. SLA would be doing a lot of kids a favor by allowing them to utilize the gym to improve their soccer skills, we have a lot of great soccer players.

This books ideology and theme is that man are given the higher power in order to be able and reproduce with women. We can truly use the phrase “It’s a mans world” to describe Gilead, but they wouldn’t have a purpose as men if they weren’t maids or women who also take a major role, yet they aren’t treated equally. In James Browns song titled “It’s a man’s, man’s , man’s world” he points it out, while describing that men have done a lot in society, but it wouldn’t of had been possible without a women or a girl. In chapter 16, a “ceremony” takes place where ofred the main character chooses to have intercourse in order to meet her “duty” as a maid and get pregnant, the purpose of Gilead, reproduction. “This is supposed to signify that we are one flesh, one being. What it really means is that she is in control, of the process and thus of the product”(pg.94) This demonstrates that the women are necessary in order to create life, yes, the man sadly oppress and control this new society, but without women, it wouldn’t be nothing.

“It’s a Man’s, Man’s, “Man’s world” 

Ofred constantly tries to understand why she is used the way that she is used, as a machine, and non-human. Her body was never respected, and we can see that from both the new world of Gilead, and the way her husband Luke treated her after she had gotten fired, he still wanted to have sexual intercourse. She starts to dislike her body, for turning into the only thing people saw and judged. “ I avoid looking down at my body, not so much because it’s shameful or immodest but because I don’t want to see it. I don’t want to look at something that determines me so completely” (Pg.63) This connects a lot to a song by Billie eilish, titled “ What was I made for” which describes how a woman used to know what she was made for, she felt power over herself, then she’s confused in what her worth is. I believe that this connects so strongly, because ofred explains how she use to wear clothes that displayed her body, now she wants to not even see it herself.

“What was I made for”

Additionally the song by Andra Day titled “ Rise up” has a message which motivates someone to be able and continue no matter what the obstacles are.  We see this as well with ofred, even though there has been moments where she give us ideas that she’ll end her life, she keeps going. Just like there are sad moments, there is also good moments, such as her having Moira, it shows that she wasn’t alone. “I put my mouth to the wooden hole. Moira? I whisper, Is that you? She says. Yes, I say. Relief goes through me. God, do i need a cigarette, says Moira. Me too, I say. I feel Ridiculously Happy” (pg. 73) The song rise up would fit perfectly, because she gets happy and rises up for Moria, knowing that they are both in the same situation. “ And I’ll Rise up high like the waves, I’ll rise up in spite of the ache,and I’ll do it thousand times again, for you.” 

“Rise up”

The Jokers bathroom scene has a soundtrack that holds a lot of emotion in cinema, where just instrumental can convey sadness and madness. It was named “hildur guðnadóttir’ and it’s a soundtrack that shows emotion with the violin. This fits perfectly with “The handmaids tale” just like in the book, in The Joker, the society that is made. Targets a minority, that will surely sooner or later fight back. A scene where this instrumental would most fit is when ofred is with the commander, any time she is with him. This is because, we get to realize how messed up the society has become, and we also understand the uncomfortableness that ofred could feel at that moment. “ I take off my shoes and stockings and my cotton underpants and slide the feathers on, under the tent of my dress. Then I take off the dress itself and slip the thin sequined straps over my shoulders. There are shoes, too, mauve ones with absurdly high heels”(pg.231)

“Hildur guðnadóttir”

For my choice of song, the connection is about religion, how ofred started to pray. In her prayers she shows how she wants to be able and have hope in order to keep going. She gives out a prayer, that she modifies in order to go with what she is feeling. “ But I’ll try it anyway. In hope, as they say on the gravestones. You must feel pretty ripped off. I guess it’s not the first time. If I were you i’d be fed up. I’d really be sick of it. I gues that’s the difference between us.” (pg.195) In this song, it’s someone who is talking to god, and telling him that they are tired, and just want to hold on during the hard times. Something that ofred wants to do as well, but slowly is giving up.

“Im Tired’

This book’s ideology and theme is that man are given the higher power in order to be able and reproduce with women. We can truly use the phrase “It’s a mans world” to describe Gilead, but they wouldn’t have a purpose as men if they weren’t maids or women who also take a major role, yet they aren’t treated equally. In James Browns song titled “It’s a man’s, Man’s, man’s World” he points it out while describing that men have done a lot in society, but it wouldn’t have been possible without a woman or a girl. In chapter 16, a “ceremony” takes place where Ofred the main character chooses to have intercourse in order to meet her “duty” as a maid and get pregnant, the purpose of Gilead, reproduction. “This is supposed to signify that we are one flesh, one being. What it really means is that she is in control, of the process and thus of the product”(pg.94) This demonstrates that women are necessary in order to create life, yes, the man sadly oppress and control this new society, but without women, it wouldn’t be nothing.

It's a Mans, Mans world"; 

https://youtu.be/zQ4Va15uJ2U?si=5pDkYEyR5IfGNaAb

Ofred constantly tries to understand why she is used the way that she is used, as a machine, and non-human. Her body was never respected, and we can see that from both the new world of Gilead, and the way her husband Luke treated her after she had gotten fired, he still wanted to have sexual intercourse. She starts to dislike her body, for turning into the only thing people see and judge. “ I avoid looking down at my body, not so much because it’s shameful or immodest but because I don’t want to see it. I don’t want to look at something that determines me so completely” (Pg.63) This connects a lot to a song by Billie Eilish, titled “ What was I made for” which describes how a woman used to know what she was made for, she felt power over herself, then she’s confused in what her worth is. I believe that this connects so strongly, because ofred explains how she use to wear clothes that displayed her body, now she wants to not even see it herself.

“What was I made for” : https://youtu.be/dpnTd9Dx2OM?si=F_hbZq6fBnYmdc8_

Additionally, the song by Andra Day titled “ Rise up” has a message that motivates someone to be able and continue no matter what the obstacles are.  We see this as well with ofred, even though there has been moments where she gives us ideas that she’ll end her life, she keeps going. Just like there are sad moments, there is also good moments, such as her having Moira, it shows that she wasn’t alone. “I put my mouth to the wooden hole. Moira? I whisper, Is that you? She says. Yes, I say. Relief goes through me. God, do i need a cigarette, says Moira. Me too, I say. I feel Ridiculously Happy” (pg. 73) The song rise up would fit perfectly, because she gets happy and rises up for Moria, knowing that they are both in the same situation. “ And I’ll Rise up high like the waves, I’ll rise up in spite of the ache,and I’ll do it thousand times again, for you.” 

“Rise up”: https://youtu.be/FBuIBaDSOa4?si=nOxof0oavyybXS5G

The Joker’s bathroom scene has a soundtrack that holds a lot of emotion in cinema, where just the instrumental can convey sadness and madness. It was named “hildur guðnadóttir’ and it’s a soundtrack that shows emotion with the violin. This fits perfectly with “The Handmaid’s tale” just like in the book, in The Joker, the society that is made. Targets a minority, that will surely sooner or later fight back. A scene where this instrumental would most fit is when ofred is with the commander, any time she is with him. This is because, we get to realize how messed up the society has become, and we also understand the uncomfortableness that ofred could feel at that moment. “ I take off my shoes and stockings and my cotton underpants and slide the feathers on, under the tent of my dress. Then I take off the dress itself and slip the thin sequined straps over my shoulders. There are shoes, too, mauve ones with absurdly high heels”(pg.231)

“Hildur guðnadóttir” : https://youtu.be/K61-tK7Xlzg?si=sFjdFtQ4knM-RLdZ

For my choice of song, the connection is about religion, how ofred started to pray. In her prayers she shows how she wants to be able and have hope in order to keep going. She gives out a prayer, that she modifies in order to go with what she is feeling. “ But I’ll try it anyway. In hope, as they say on the gravestones. You must feel pretty ripped off. I guess it’s not the first time. If I were you I’d be fed up. I’d really be sick of it. I guess that’s the difference between us.” (pg.195) In this song, it’s someone who is talking to god, and telling him that they are tired, and just want to hold on during the hard times. Something that ofred wants to do as well, but slowly is giving up.

“Im Tired’: https://youtu.be/RdOX1gqzprc?si=oLQ2WUUP46TxKxza

As the maids stand in a circle, they point and blame Janine for being what would be known as unwomen. This is after she openly talked about how she was raped at fourteen, giving her an unwanted pregnancy which led her to have an abortion, something that was her full right. In the society of Gilead, pregnancies are sacred, if either the mom (maid) wants it or not. This secret which was told by Janine herself, brought her a sort of consequence. As she kneeled down, with her hands behind her back Martha could see. Everyone surrounds her and starts to chant, “Her fault” as they all point at her. “Last week, Janine burst into tears. Aunt Helena made her kneel at the front of the classroom. Hands behind her back, where we could all see her, her red face and dripping nose. Her hair was dull blond, her eyelashes so light they seemed not there, the lost eyelashes of someone who’d been in a fire. Burned eyes. She looked disgusting: weak, squirmy, blotchy, pink, like a newborn mouse. None of us wanted to look like, ever. For a moment, even though we knew what was being done to her, we despised her” (Pg.72) This scene demonstrates and shows a lot about what the book is all about. Women mentally abusing women, women being controlled by a society that denies their right to their bodies, and shames them if they oppose this new society’s ideologies. But no one is to blame these maids who shame Janine because they have been shamed/scared in order to follow the established beliefs, of being objects to give birth to children. For my first Lit log, I demonstrated this scene, in order to show the visual representation of how Janine would have looked and felt. In my drawing, she kneels down in front of six maids all pointing at her with their red long dresses that cover every inch of their bodies. Whitecaps cover their heads and eyes. I shade the sides of the paper in dark and in a triangle shape leaving blank up into where Janine is kneeling. This is to demonstrate the attention that she is being given. But not the good type of attention, the one where she is being stared at and it makes her feel uncomfortable around all the maids, chanting at her about how she’s a crybaby. As well as the shading of the drawing, the maid’s dress color is more light red, meanwhile Jenina is bright red in order to show her apart from the others. To put her in the spotlight of the drawing, her hands can also be seen behind her, giving the viewer perspective of her hands, in a way we are the ones who see how she’s helpless. It’s a cycle of fear, Janine is humiliated, scared, meanwhile as Aunt Lydia states in the passage. “ You are an example”, an example to all the other women to not go against the beliefs. Especially when it comes to abortion, where the punishment is death, for both the maid and the doctor who decides to help. The maids will know not to commit the same “crime” or they will have to face a punishment.

I felt very good; and, we knew that we helped our environment., One of the park engineers thanked us and said that it was nice of us to be cleaning the park. I feel like by cleaning up, we made our environment safer, healthier and cleaner, we made essential workers happy; and, hopefully, we inspired others to clean up themselves. For example, my six year old, younger brother also helped out. He went around the park with a stick, grabbing the trash, and putting it into the trash bag. Holding a public park cleanup showed him and all those in our neighborhood that keeping the environment clean is important. Involving young people, like my brother, in these activities, teaches the next generation to care about our planet. Perhaps, in the future,he can do a similar clean up at his school, helping my mission and making my idea grow.

Many organizations are working to help our city and country improve the environment, increase air quality, and to make their parks more beautiful. People are also trying to use solar energy, reducing their dependence on power plants that spread greenhouse gases into our environment. Another way to make a difference in the fight for our planet is by protesting, many people gather and protest climate change. There are many changes that will reduce our impact on our planet and help fix the problems we have already caused. There are also websites that people can see to learn more about this topic, and I think that many of these websites are kid friendly.targeting the future generations is important, because when we talk about climate, it’s their future that we are looking forward to. There’s also websites that do stuff like I did in a big group, clean parks, plant trees, and other cool and safe activities to help the environment. I learned so much more about helping our environment and enjoyed helping make a difference in my community with my family. Maybe you and some friends would like to help out the community in a similar way? Go ahead,and grab that litter!

Are you someone who lives on planet Earth? Do you breathe? Do you or anyone you know have asthma?Well,listen up because while we talk, my planet, our planet is making a huge change, and not for the good. The problem here is climate change, and the real main problem is us humans. Many glaciers are melting, the average temperature of the planet is rising every day. Scientists are discovering that in a short amount of time, our planet could go through a change; causing an increase in many diseases and deaths.

Krabi, Thailand

Temple in Japan

Our planet is important to me because I’d like to travel around the world some day. When these changes happen, the adventures I might want have, the places I want to explore and see with my own eyes could change before I’m even an adult with the means to experience them. To say the least, the end of the world has begun, in a slow but very real process. This isn’t to scare you.here’s still time to make a change, and prevent this from happening. “How can I help out?” I’m glad you asked, there is a lot of stuff you can do! But, before I show you how to make a change yourself, from the comfort of your house; I want to explain what causes these changes. One way that you might already know to protect the planet is recycling. This is a great way to protect our atmosphere. The plastic, and all the trash you throw out, is sent to junk yards, and then it sits in landfills or is burned. But, plastic is hard to get rid of, it takes years for it to decompose, and most of that plastic winds up in the ocean. This causes many more problems. Once it’s in the ocean, sea animals digest most of the trash without knowing what it is. This trash also kills coral reefs, these reefs produce half of the planet’s oxygen. So, the plastic bottle you toss in the trash kills ocean animals and it decreases our planet’s oxygen supply. You remember oxygen? It’s that gas we humans need in order to survive. Animals around our planet; like the wolverine in the Arctic, are trying to adjust to climate change. For many animals, their chances of survival are low. Their habitats are being erased; they are no longer not finding homes in which they can live safely.. For animals, it’s their habitat, for humans it’s our health, and depending on where you live, it can also have changes in your environment, and leaves a lot of people without homes. As the heat rises, wildfires start in many places, a very good example of this, is in places such as California. There have been wildfires, due to the heat, and the heat rises due to the toxic gasses produced by factories. The gasses break the ozone layer, which protects us from harmful radiation from the sun. Of course all of this might seem crazy and some people might not care. But, I do. Many beautiful natural treasures in this world are in danger. Maybe you don’t care because it might not impact your life directly, but many people have been impacted. . The effects of climate changes are reaching places that haven’t even been discovered yet.Sadly two things could happen to these places. One, they might be underwater in 10 or 5 years. Scientists had predicted that many changes were gonna happen in later upcoming years, but more recently, they found out that these changes are more closer than they had expected. Climate Change Is Accelerating, Bringing The World ‘Dangerously Close’ to Irreversible Change .Secondly, places such as a coral or a beautiful field full of flowers, could turn gray, due to the plants being dead after being in contact with a lot of toxic chemicals. So, if you’d like to explore the wonders of the world, make a change! You don’t have to do god/ goddess work. Just recycle, use your own personal bags at the store, try and save electricity, and water. Many of the power that goes to your house are from power plants that make toxic gasses or support an environmental organization so they can make big changes, with the help of you.

The change we need, starts with you!

My Annotated Bibliography

2020 hasn’t been the best way to welcome the new decade. It sure has been a roller coaster, Virus, Police brutality, and it’s election year. Yet the world has corona, but America is having so many more problems than just a virus. The sad part is that these problems aren’t new, they have been seen for so long, but no one makes a change. I made a drawing to represent what my 2020 looks like in my point of view. People protest for a change, but yet they wear masks, because there’s a virus around them. President Donal Trump is seen walking away, refusing to hear his people. This puts a single story into Americans, people see american as an unfair place, and it shouldn’t be like that. We are slowly making America ungreat. This is also why I made the background as the american flag burning. It’s not a hateful way, but because America is slowly burning, people aren’t heard and find a way to be heard. They start to destroy stores and burning stuff. Yet, the president still walks away from it. The BLM movement has been coming out a lot, seeing this as a chance to be heard, many other movements have also come out to make their problems known. America, hasn’t also been the only place in the world with pain, other countries have been fighting for survival. As a teen living in this country, I have felt unsafe, and sometimes worried about my family. We have tried to stay safe in quarantine, we try and spend time together, and it’s a good way to get closer to your loved ones. But with the countrys actions of treating non-white people is worrying. I’ve seen in the news that kids are being put in cages like animals in the border. Sometimes, I think, what if it was me? What if it was my siblings?. It’s not much about me, but my siblings. I can’t do much being 14, but if I had much more power, I would use it for good. 2021 is around the corner and everyone is praying for a better year, with a better view. Time is being wasted, lifes are being taken, it’s a change for today.

2020 hasn’t been the best way to welcome the new decade. It sure has been a roller coaster, Virus, Police brutality, and it’s election year. Yet the world has corona, but America is having so many more problems than just a virus. The sad part is that these problems aren’t new, they have been seen for so long, but no one makes a change. I made a drawing to represent what my 2020 looks like in my point of view. People protest for a change, but yet they wear masks, because there’s a virus around them. President Donal Trump is seen walking away, refusing to hear his people. This puts a single story into Americans, people see american as an unfair place, and it shouldn’t be like that. We are slowly making America ungreat. This is also why I made the background as the american flag burning. It’s not a hateful way, but because America is slowly burning, people aren’t heard and find a way to be heard. They start to destroy stores and burning stuff. Yet, the president still walks away from it. The BLM movement has been coming out a lot, seeing this as a chance to be heard, many other movements have also come out to make their problems known. America, hasn’t also been the only place in the world with pain, other countries have been fighting for survival. As a teen living in this country, I have felt unsafe, and sometimes worried about my family. We have tried to stay safe in quarantine, we try and spend time together, and it’s a good way to get closer to your loved ones. But with the countrys actions of treating non-white people is worrying. I’ve seen in the news that kids are being put in cages like animals in the border. Sometimes, I think, what if it was me? What if it was my siblings?. It’s not much about me, but my siblings. I can’t do much being 14, but if I had much more power, I would use it for good. 2021 is around the corner and everyone is praying for a better year, with a better view. Time is being wasted, lifes are being taken, it’s a change for today.