This project has had many ups and downs which created a lot of difficulty. Some parts of the project went very smoothly and turned out great. Other parts took a lot of time and we wound up scrapping it anyway. 

One big difficulty that we had, was to find an audience that would be reached by the different things that we made. We started thinking and we believe that the number one audience that we could reach would be the parents of the children. This is because they are the people who are ultimately responsible for the health of their child, and they are the ones to blame if their child is obese. 

Another problem that we ran into was with the website. We originally created a google site. This would have worked well since multiple people can edit it at the same time without creating any issues, but we came to the conclusion that it looked dull and would not grab anyone’s attention like we wanted. We decided to change to a wix.com site. This looks really nice and works very smoothly. The drawback to this however is that only one person can edit the website at a time. This slowed down the production of the website, but in the end made it look better.

Among these issue with the web site we ran into a problem with our “live demonstration” that were planning on doing. We had originally decided to do it as a group, but as time went on, we figured that no one actually had 3 or 4 hours to spend on a week day when we are all already in center city, to stand around and hand out flyers. We all had to be home by a certain time and we couldn’t come to a consensus on a time that could work for everyone. This eventually led to us scrapping the entire idea and just to focus on the website and the other aspects of the project. 

Throughout the entire project, many things have gone wrong and been very difficult. Overall after all that, I think that we created a very good project that we can be proud of. Especially if it is successful and gets to some people. 

Throughout the year I feel that I have grown, not only as a student but also as a person. Most of my pieces of work have been about family and friends, and through these I learned many different things about them. One example of this was in the beginning of the year we wrote about a piece of art that we observed. We got to choose which piece to look at and I chose one that sister did. It was of a circus elephant standing on top of a ball, and all around it was a rainbow shooting out from every side. I talked about how this was the perfect embodiment of my sister as a person. That she always liked the odd thing, like an elephant standing on a ball, but she also liked to make surreal images that are left in your mind.

Later in the year I compared that very same image of an elephant to a memory that I had of my friend and I playing paintball. I said “In those six seconds I had enough cover to stand up and sprint across the field firing blindly with my left hand (probably not hitting anything but scaring the opponents). I looked over and I was reminded of a picture that my sister once painted. It was a picture of an elephant standing on top of a ball, with colors shooting out of it. I felt kind of like that elephant, precariously perched with colors flying at me from all directions.” This story always bring a smile to my face because it makes me think of how lucky I am to have such a great family, and such great friends. 

About two months later we wrote a paper about our different linguistic backgrounds. As an Irish/German/American I had a lot to say about the many different languages that go on with my family. I said in my language autobiography that “It’s really confusing when people speak all of their languages at the same time (In my family). I am the only one who can understand all of the languages. I can’t speak them back, but I act as an interpreter.”

Introduction:

The purpose of the essay was to explain my idea of what language is. I say in my essay that I think that language shows someone’s state of being. It has no representation of your IQ or of your mental capacity. One thing that was very difficult, was writing about my language. It is hard to explain to people who cannot understand it, so everybody.

Paper:

My family is a regular pot-luck of languages, everyone brings something new to the table. Everybody, knows something different. For instance, my Mom knows french, my Dad knows Spanish and Gaelic. My brothers know German, and my one brother knows french too. It’s really confusing when people speak all of their languages at the same time. I am the only one who can understand all of the languages. I can’t speak them back, but I act as an interpreter. I translate the other languages into English, for the other family members that can’t speak the language. 

My parents rely on me to translate what the other parts of the family are saying. Even my brothers’ English is slurred and I am one of the only people who can understand him. I have had a lot of experience with people who cannot speak English correctly. This is because my brother suffers from a disease which causes you to have less control over your muscles. Actions like speaking are usually very slurred and most people can’t understand him. My brother and I are the only ones who can understand him all the time. It is very often that my mother with ask me to translate what he said.

Another way that I have had experience with people who can’t fully speak English, is with my cello teacher. I met him when I was 5 years old. When you are 5, you don't talk much anyway. Language is not your first priority. I was scared. I was starting a new instrument, which for me meant a new language and it meant a new teacher. 

I walked into the room awkwardly with my new cello. It was a little bit bigger than my 3 foot tall body. I see my new teacher for the first time and we talked very quickly.

He said, "Hello, I named Dr. Yu. Your named?

I was confused by the question. Was he asking what I wanted to be called?

I replied hesitantly,"Teige?"

He replied “Are you sure? Confused you sound like.”

I didn’t know what to do. I then looked up at my dad. He laughed and said “I don’t think Teige can understand you”

Dr. Yu replied to this by saying “I sorry, I no help it, just way I speak.”

I have always remembered this moment, specifically when he said that he couldn’t help it, and that is just the way he speaks. That it wasn’t his fault that he spoke like that. For some reason, before he had said this, I just thought that everybody talked the same way and that some people would put on a different voice in order to make a joke, or to seem funny. It had never occurred to me that his voice was a product of his surroundings.

When I was younger, I didn’t understand English as a language. I never could understand the tones of a normal everyday voice. I always had this problem, because I have a disease. This disease is called synesthesia. Its where I see colors and taste different things depending on what I hear. This caused me to create my own language. Basically it just consisted of my favorite sounds that I could make, I also used tastes as words. Colors or tastes didn’t mean words like we use in English, but rather thoughts or ideas. Many people who have this disease, wind up like this too. An example of this, is like the taste of metal, this to me means that something is out of place or is going wrong. What this meant for a kid like me was a way of expressing myself that English couldn’t do for me. I am told that a normal person thinks in words or phrases, I however retained the language that I had when I was younger and still use that to think. It is kind of like a short hand that no one else in the world can understand.

 I used to take pride in it, that I was one in 200,000 that could think like this or even see the colors that I see. The only big problem in this language is that no one else can understand it. Try as I might I could never seem to teach the language to anyone else. Around the age of 5, I gave up trying to teach it to anyone. I figured that they just weren’t going to get it, and that it must be as difficult for them as English is to me. This has always affect the way I think and the way I do math. 

That is why I have always had the belief that language is more than just a way of communicating, but rather a way of thinking. Some times your language is a representative of your education, but the way I see it most of the time, language is more a representative of your state of being.

Reflection:

I enjoyed talking about current issues that I face, and to tune people into my thoughts on the subject. The issues that I talked about are important to my family and I. Most of my family believes the same thing as me on this issue. 

Earth Less:

Does no one care anymore? Is the earth worth less than this tar sands? I believe the world is at a breaking point and it is getting closer and closer to breaking, and this will be the straw that broke the camels back. When I look at my children I think of all the countless injustices that we are doing to them. I do my part to not pollute, but not everybody is doing the right thing. These companies are trying to get as much money as possible while the earth goes up in flames. Is that fair to the animals? Is that fair to the planet? As a native american I believe that the earth is important. I ask you, is that fair to your children, your own flesh and blood? If we just stopped now and take all the money that we are putting into this, and put it into making wind farms we could make enough energy to power 175,000 house holds. This energy would be continuously renewable and would never run out. It would even create jobs for many people in production and to keep them working. This is the kind of energy people can feel good about. Its the kind of energy that could help keep this plant of ours from reaching its breaking point. I’m not asking everyone to live like me or my tribe, but if we all just did our part and invested our money in responsible companies that would work towards a brighter future. A future that I can feel good about leaving to my family when I leave the world to them.

Regrets from a president:

When I was the 43 president of America, and like 42 presidents before me, I would have never let anything like this happen. If it were still up to me, we would not get involved. While I was president, I signed legislation that said that tar sands are to dirty for the American government. This law was made just to stop the use of tar sands. It is my belief this type of fuel is not in our best interests. I know some people say that this is hypocritical. My answer to this is that I have learned from my mistakes in the past and that even though I say this, I still believe that we should drill for as much crude oil as we possibly can. This is because it can benefit our economy and give us the push we need to put us back on top of the world. Also that now that I am not in the oval office, I am free to say what I want without any fear of who will support me after I say it. It is my belief that if we use this tar sands oil, then we will be dealing a harsh blow to the environment. This oil is one of the dirtiest forms of energy that we can get. It causes dirty water and causes dirty pollutants. When I look at my family ranch and think of the problems that this generation can cause for the next. I feel terrible that my ranch might not be in existence in a couple generations, because of the tar sands.

New country for old men:

Growing up as a little boy in Texas, y’all know to recognize ai good thing when it happens. When I heard about the tar sands projects, I jumped for joy! I could finally be able to support my children, so they could go to college and have the life that I never had. They could go from college and get a better more worth while job than me and be able to support me when I get older and can’t work. It was tough for them growing, with their mother dying of cancer when they were only 2 and all. Poor Sara, and Violet. They are only 17 now, and can’t get really jobs here in Texas. The only jobs a person with out a college degree can get down here are the jobs working on oil refineries, and they are to dangerous for my precious girls to work at. Just like the ones that are opening up to refine the tar sands. The other day I talk to the man in charge of the plant. He done gave me a job. With the money from this job, I can fix that leak in the roof, or fix our old broken truck. These tar sands are your way of giving us a break for all the tough times that you has given us in the past few years. I prayed every night for a job like this, and you finally answered, you finally did it. My only question is why didn’t do it sooner? From what I understand the pipeline will create 20,000 jobs. Why are people so hesitate on this? It is perfect for a time when American needs jobs. I don’t want to seem ungrateful or something. So any way thank you god and please watch over my family and friends. Amen

Descriptive Essay

9/16/11

Homage to Family - 

Color flying, sun shining bright, leaves falling. I didn’t have a care in the word, except the next paint ball that might hit me. I was running left, then right, trying to dodge all the paint. I can still feel the gun in my hand. The push from the CO2 pushing the ball out of the chamber towards its target. Paint rushing by my head, I duck behind a bunker. I was pinned down, so I shouted to my friend “I'm pinned! Help me out”. So he proudly stood up and fired off seven bullets. In those six seconds I had enough cover to stand up and sprint across the field firing blindly with my left hand (probably not hitting anything but scaring the opponents). I looked over and I was reminded of a picture that my sister once painted. It was a picture of an elephant standing on top of a ball, with colors shooting out of it. I felt kind of like that elephant, precariously perched with colors flying at me from all directions.

Soon after my daring escape we fired our last bullets and just like that, the game was over. We all got up from our hiding spots and went and shook hands. The animosity that was there only seconds ago was now completely gone and replaced with grins and smirks. No care over who won or lost, just a care over how much fun we had.

We looked around to see how many times we had been hit. I saw two blotches of red and orange on my pants and one other pink shot on my shoe. Then I saw it, the blotch of reds, pinks, and oranges that used to be my friend. He was covered from head to toe in color. He looked like a clown that was caught in the rain. We all laughed for a while and refilled our ammo and started again. The animosity soon returning.

When I think about these moments in my life, I think about my sister, and my family. I have a big family and my family is very important to me. I think about her because she is the one who painted the picture. When I think about her I feel pride. Pride in what she has done, and how she has handled everything.  My sister now lives in Germany with her boyfriend. When she moved she was just 25. She moved over there with my oldest brother who was just 22 when he left to travel the world. Now he is 31 and she is 29. They are both very successful by themselves. One time we went to visit them, and I felt like a fish out of water. It was very difficult to fit in. Not many people knew English, to this day I have no idea how my sister and my brother lived through it. 

One time my brother and I went to the bakery to get pastries for the family and we had to order in German. We sat there thinking about what to say to the person. Using our collective knowledge of the German language we said “fear chocolate pastries”. The women behind the counter winced at our butchering of her language, then she laughed. She said in the most southern accent that I could have imagined “Do y’all want 4 chocolate pastries?” My brother and I said yes ma’am and paid for the pastries and left. That whole time I was thinking, that this would only happen if I was with my family. If I had been with my friends, everything would have gone off without a hitch. 

I believe that through everything, your family is the most important thing in the whole world. This is because if you don’t have family then you will be lost. Its what keeps you on track and keeps you out of danger. Even through the craziness and yelling at each other, I love my family till the bitter end, and I would do anything for them.

Later that night, after shooting almost 4000 paint balls we collapsed in front of the camp fire. Something about watching a camp fire is hypnotizing. The way it sways and moves like nothing else on earth. It’s motions are so fluid that it is almost like a liquid. It just makes you want to stop everything that you are doing and look at it. Even though we were tired, and ache from a day packed with crazy amounts of paintball we still needed light to fight off the quickly darkening hill that we were on. This meant that someone needed to accomplish the incredible daunting task of getting firewood. If you have never done this in the dark, it is very problematic. This is because we had no other form of light that we could take with us, so that we could go and get the wood for the fire. So we did what every young teenager has wanted to do, we made a torch. 

First we got a paint roller and stuck it on top of large stick. Then we wrapped the paint roller in string so that it would burn. After that it was the moment of truth. Would it light and stay on fire, or would it crash and burn? Miraculously, when we lit it, it stayed on fire. 

Then we left the already dwindling camp fire, with the torch in hand. If you ever thought that a torch would be a good idea, it is not. As soon as we got out of sight of the fire, the torch melted something started dripping onto our hands. Then of course they all went out. With light the forest can be gorgeous, but when the lights go out you see the underbelly of the forest. You see how malicious and scary it can be. We couldn't see a single thing. It was as if someone had blind folded us and left us there. It is a freaky feeling not being able to see what is around you. The only way we were able to get back to the camp fire was by using our phones as flashlights

When we got back to the camp fire, our parents inquired to where we had been gone for so long. We answered truthfully, we said that we had no clue. Then we told them all about how the torch that we had made had gone out and that we had been stranded. Our parents reply to this was, “Where is the fire wood?” 

We just laughed and went to pitch the tent for us to sleep in. We spent a good 2 hours trying to get the tent to stand on its own, but to no avail. So we did the next logical thing, we slept in the car. This works sometimes during the summer and when the weather is nice. Unfortunately for us with was 30 degrees, needless to say we didn’t get much sleep. 

That night I realized that my friends and family are crucial to my life and that if I didn’t have them I would have nothing. I believe this because your rely on them through the bad, and you help them up when they are down. To this day, I still believe that if you have no money, no home, if you have you friends and family, you can get through it.

Do you receive a trans pass from the school district, in order to get to and from school? Well, until today there was a chance that that could have been cut from the budget. Thankfully SEPTA released a statement saying that it will continue to bargain with the school district of Philadelphia. This relieves many parents and students of the stress of finding out how to take their child to school, or finding out how to pay for the public transportation.

I know it sounds easy to pay the 2 dollars for a normal bus to school, but most people don't realize that some people have to take the trolley or multiple buses. This can turn out to be very costly if you are taking 3 buses to get to school in the morning and 3 buses to get back home at night. Then you will have to do that 180 days. This all adds up to a grand total of $2160. This is way out of the realm of possibility for some families. This money could be put toward furthering a students education, like college but instead these families might not be able to afford to send their child to school everyday of the week. This could increase the drop out rate and again increase the incarceration rate because the students will have to find a way to make money for school, but won't be able to get a job because of their current education status.

http://www.usaforafrica.org/

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113338751

http://www.core-online.org/History/voting_rights.htm

My first attempt was not very good. I had some spacing issues and I spent most of the time fixing it. Then when it was fixed it looked too perfectly spaced. In the better one I used better spacing so that it looks nicer and you are more likely to remember it.

Also I didn't like the layout so I decided to revamp the entire look of it. I moved the picture over to the side so that it was by itself. Then I moved the words over to the right.

I still kept many of the same things though. Like I still used the contrast from black red and white. Also I used the same background which bleeds over. I still used all the words and images but I just changed the color and font size of them.

For some reason it won't let me upload the second fixed picture

The days are:

Monday= lunes

Tuesday= martes

Wednesday=miércoles

Thursday= jueves

Friday= viernes           

Saturday=sábado

Sunday=domingo

*notice that the days are not caputalized unlike the english translation.

Teige walks up and talks to Anthony who is singing the days of the weeks

Anthoney ¡Hola! ¿Le gustaría decir los días de la semana conmigo?

Teige: ¡Sí!

Breaks into song

lunes martes miércoles jueves viernes sábado domingo

lunes martes miércoles jueves viernes sábado domingo

All: Yay

English translation

Anthony: Hello! Would you like to say the days of the weeks with me?

Teige: Yes!

Monday Tuesday Wednsday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday

Monday Tuesday Wednsday Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday

All: Yay!