Dejected

Revelation

Trauamtic

Embankment (on the Rhine river)

Embezzle

Eclectic

Pleadingly

Adhesive

Malevolent

Lagging

The Alchemyst, by Michael Scott, is about the legend of Nicholas Flamel, who discovered the secret of eternal life in the pages of the Book of Abraham the Mage. It is the book he swore to protect at all costs. But the book has other secrets too. It contains the knowledge needed to destroy the world. That’s exactly what Dr. John Dee plans to do when he gets his hands on the Book. Humankind won’t know what’s happened until it’s too late. And Sophie and Josh Newman are about to find themselves inexorably drawn into one of the biggest magical battles of all time. The fate of the human race is in their hands.

I would have loved to say something about Michael Scott’s style of writing, but I can’t. It’s very… well, basic. A no-frills style. No cliffhangers, no red herrings, nothing. Don’t get me wrong though. The general book and story is amazing. I’m not saying the book is bland. I’m saying the style of writing is plain, unvarnished. Whether that improves the quality of the book or decreases the quality of the book I don’t know. It depends. It’s a question of opinion. It varies from reader to reader. I personally don’t like those types of books very much. They get boring after a while.

 

My absolute favorite part of the book was actually the first chapter. The first chapter was my favorite part. It surprises even me. In this part, Flamel and Dee are fighting each other in Flamel’s bookshop. Like with Jack Heath, Scott made the most of his extensive vocabulary and gave me an amazing description of the battle between two masters of magic. It felt so real to me that when Dee punched Flamel, I flinched!

 

About the author, Michael Scott. Michael Scott was born on 28^th of September 1959 in Dublin. He is Irish and has written a great many books for young readers as well as for adults.  I also discovered that he has written many drama/romance novels under the pseudonym of  Anna

Dillon! His works have been nominated for several important awards. The Alchemyst is the first book (of six) in the Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel series has been nominated for 10 literary awards. The Alchemyst won the 2008 Rhode Island Book Award (Teens) but sadly none of the other books won any awards but the series is to be adapted to films. He has written over a 100 books in his 25 years of being an author. If you don’t read the Alchemyst and other books in the series, you are missing out on a magical roller coaster ride that is truly exhilarating. I am eagerly looking forward to reading The Magician, the second book in the series over the holidays.

Vocabulary Definitions: Pictorial

Innovation

Pavilion

Seminary

Jubilation

Extortion

Innovation

Seminary

Jubilation

Extortion

Pavilion

The Lab

The Lab, by Jack Heath, is a sci-fi thriller about Agent Six of Hearts, a 16 year-old superhuman who is an agent of the Deck, a team of special agents fighting to uphold the Code (a list of humanitarian rules similar to the Geneva Convention) in a city that’s under the iron grip of the ruthless company ChaoSonic. But Six has a deadly secret. He is the product of a Code-breaking and illegal genetic experiment by the Lab, an equally- ruthless division of ChaoSonic. When the Deck begins investigating the Lab, Six tries hard to keep his origins a secret from the other Deck agents. But then he meets Kyntak, a boy with the same genetically engineered DNA. As Six’s life spirals out of control, he must face his most perilous mission yet. And it might not be a one that he survives.

My favorite part of the book was when Six fights a ChaoSonic combat robot in a fight to the death. The robot has enhanced reflexes, and it’s almost impossible to penetrate its body armour. Jack utilized his descriptive powers to the fullest here so I felt like the fight was going on in front of my eyes! This is yet another superb trait that Jack has, an amazing descriptive ability. If I had a million dollars, I would give that and more to him, because he was only 13 when he wrote The Lab. I didn’t like sci-fi that much when I started this book, but once again Jack’s style of writing kept me hooked until the last word.

Jack Heath’s style of writing is one that depends heavily on elaborate twists in the story and dead ends where a reader is left scratching his head. To further spice up the action-packed chapters, he adds steep cliffhangers; near-death scenarios and suspense that mounts up until you can’t take it anymore and you have to turn the page. In that lies the secret to Jack’s success. He writes so that it is incredibly hard to not feel the urge to keep reading. This book was so good that when my mother called me for dinner, I was furious!

Jack Heath was born on August 23 1986 in Sydney. He is writer of young adult fiction and other than his Six of Hearts series he has written the Ashley Arthur series. His work is often compared to the work of Robert Muchamore, author of the CHERUB series and Anthony Horowitz, author of the Alex Rider series. All three authors have the same traits in their stories, which include redemption, coming of age, commercialism, conspiracy, corruption, greed, heroism and many others. Jack says that he writes only to “keep people entertained from the first page to the last.” If that is his goal, he’s certainly achieved it. When Jack was 13, he wrote The Lab to impress a girl who liked reading. He finished the first draft at 17. He sent it to publishers, keeping his age anonymous until he was sure they liked it. For a 17 year-old boy that’s not too bad!

For all you sci-fi lovers out there, if you don’t read this book and the other books in the series, then you’re missing out on some thing really good.

Under a War- Torn Sky

Under a War- Torn Sky, by L.M. Elliot, is a lucid gripping tale about courage, sacrifice, love and loss during the Nazi occupation of Europe during WW2.

Shot down on a dangerous mission in Germany, 19 year-old bomber pilot Henry Forester finds himself in a land infested with people who would find boundless joy in seeing his head on their mantelpiece. Henry is suddenly forced to use all his wits, the kindness of strangers and the resourcefulness and cunning of the French Resistance maquis to survive a perilous journey across Nazi-controlled Europe in order to get back to home and the girl he loves.

The book is written using great vocabulary, but L.M. Elliot wrote the book in such a way that even though endless reams of adjectives can be found on a single page, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand what’s going on. I think that she is one of the best authors I’ve read because I didn’t know that this book was inspired by her grandfather until the very last page. I admire her for that; her skill to make a story sound like her own from the first word. It made the book more interesting. However, there was one flaw about this book. In the first few chapters, she spent too many words describing events that need less than 300 words to describe them. This book is very different from other WW2 books that I’ve read. In other books, the protagonist was usually recording events in a diary format. This book is not just a collection of Henry’s experiences, but also a collection of every thought that runs through his head, every emotion that he experiences and every person he meets. That is what makes this book stand out in bold relief from other WW2 books

My favorite parts of the book were the parts that mentioned the kindness of the strangers that helped him before the French Resistance stepped in. I felt happy that in fiction and in real life ordinary people were willing to take extraordinary risk to help people they didn’t know just so that they would see the light of dawn. I felt a twinge of sadness as I read these parts because in real life, some people were not as fortunate as some of the families who sheltered him. If they escaped prosecution, they’d be wanted fugitives the Nazi’s, with their cold-blooded brutality, would not rest until they were caught and when they were, they would be tortured to death or sent to death camps like Ravensbruck and Aushwitz.

L.M. Elliot was inspired to writer Under a War-Torn Sky after hearing stories of her grandfather’s adventures when he was trapped behind enemy lines. Her grandfather was also a bomber pilot during WW2 and was also shot down on a mission to Germany. Under a War-Torn Sky has won several awards which include the Notable Book in Social Studies for Young People (NCSS/CBC), 2002 Jefferson Cup Honor Book, 2002 Winner, Borders’ Original Voices Award for Young Adult Literature, 2001 Best Children’s Books of the Year, 2002.

There was one part at the beginning of the book that touched me. After a nightmare, Henry sings a poem called High Flight to himself to calm himself down. An American RAF pilot who wrote it just before being killed in action wrote this poem. Here it is:

“ Oh I have slipped the surly bonds of earth,

And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;

Sunward I’ve climbed and joined the tumbling mirth

Of sun-split clouds-and done a hundred things

You have not dreamed of-wheeled and soared

And swung

High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,

I’ve chased the shouting wind along and flung

My eager craft through footless halls of air.

Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue

I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace

Where never lark, or even eagle, flew;

And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod

The high untrespassed sanctity of space,

Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.”

My Bintaro Lama field trip

I stepped off the bus at the Bintaro Lama kampung. My group members, Stuart Lyall and Aditya Nijasure, followed close behind.I saw a brown river, similar to the one at the AETRA purification plant. We were about to see how this river water, with the help of WatSan, an aid organization,was purified for the people who lived in the kampung. Intriguing, isn't it? We went to 3 purification stations, stations 6,2 and 4 , in that order. I'll describe each one of them:

Station 6: At station 6, representatives from WatSan added two different products to the water to make it instantly drinkable. The first product was Aqua Tabs. Aqua Tabs are about a half-inch long, and come in packets of 10. Each pack costs Rp.3000, and the people of the kampung are getting a good deal because one, just one tiny Aqua Tab can purify 20 liters of clear (but germ-infested) water. If the water is more turbid, then two Aqua Tabs will need to be added. The second one was Air Rahmat. Air Rahmat is a liquid water purifier, and has the same power as Aqua Tabs. One capful of Air Rahmat (5mL) will purify 20 liters of water. Like Aqua Tabs, if the water is more turbid, then two or three capfuls need to be added.

Station 2: Station two wasn't a water purification station. It was a Public Health Promotion center. There, the children of the kampung learn how to keep water safe, proper hygiene habits, and the importance of washing hands. They even sang an Indonesian hand washing song for us before we left!

Station 4: At station four, WatSan representatives added a substance called PUR into the water. In the demonstration, the PUR acted like alum and formed floc at the bottom of the pot. The water was then poured through a ceramic filter and voila, clean water!

I was kind of sad to leave the kampung. The people there had been so friendly with us in the short time that we had stayed there. The contrast between their way of life and our way of life was HUGE. I hope, some day, they will never have to worry about purifying their water again.

Everything on a Waffle

Everything on a Waffle by Polly Horvath is about a young girl named Primrose Squarp who thinks her parents were not killed in a violent storm but will be towed back to her by a whale in a matter of time. Weird, isn’t it? But the real story is much more than that. It tells stories of Coal Harbor, a small town on Vancouver Island the people in this town who are a big part of this humorous yet heartwarming book like Miss Bowzer, owner of The Girl on the Red Swing, who offers good advice, a willing ear and all food (served at her restaurant), including lasagna, served on a waffle!

I’ve read a lot of books with citywide scales, worldwide scales, and even universe-wide scales. But “Everything on a Waffle” focuses on a small town and since a lot can happen in a small town, it makes the book more interesting. Also, the significant decrease in information (compared to other chapter books) makes “Everything on a Waffle” a book that you can really enjoy.

My favorite parts of the book were the recipes at the end of each chapter. These recipes were mostly Miss Bowzer’s creations, but Primrose’s mother invented two of them. Two of the recipes are Chow Mein Noodle Cookies and Carrots In An Apricot Glaze. Some of these recipes sound delicious, and others just plain wacky, so I think I might try to make some of them.

This book of Polly Horvath won a Newberry Honor Award in 2001. In the very first page of the book, the author says that Coal Harbor is a real place, but she changed its geography to suit the story.

Polly Horvath was born on 30 January 1957. She has written more than 10 books for children, among them are The Happy Yellow Car and Everything on a Waffle. I found a surprising fact about Polly Horvath. She has been writing since the age of eight. She says that she doesn’t know where the ideas for her stories come from, but she does know she likes books with food in them! While selling their (her family’s) house, their realtor would come over in the evening and tell stories about Coal Harbor which, funnily enough, had only one restaurant which served everything on a waffle – for real! I am looking forward to reading more of Polly Horvath’s wonderful books.

Questions

1. What percentage of the world's supply of water is fresh water?

About 2.5% of the Earth's supply of water is fresh water.

2. Where is the world's supply of fresh water found?

2% is found in the polar ice caps, .49% is found in the form of groundwater and o.o1% os found in the atmosphere, rivers and lakes.

3. Even though the supply of fresh water is abundant it is still a problem. Why?

Although the world;s supply of fresh water is abundant it is still a problem because people an water are distributed unevenly

4.Observe the map of world annual precipitation (opposite).

(a) Describe the changes in rainfall that occur as you move from the southern to the northern tip of Africa.

AS you move from the southern tip of Africa to the northern tip, you pass the Tropic of Capricorn, The Equator and the Tropic of Cancer. Rainfall is highest at the Equator, about 1500 to 2000 millimeters. but is lowest at the Tropic of Cancer, which gets less than 250 millimeters of rainfall a year. I think this is because the Sahara Desert is located there.

(b) Describe the changes in rainfall that occur as you move from the western to the eastern tip of Australia along the Tropic of Capricorn.

At the west coast of Australia, water is very scarce, less than 250 millimeters of rainfall a year. But as you move closer to the east coast, it gets wetter and wetter. I think this is because the severity of tropical storms is greater that the severity of storms on the west coast.

5. Observe the map of water availability per person.

(a)Which parts of the world appear to have a large amount of water available per person?

Russia, Canada and Indonesia all have large amounts of water available per person. The northern part of South America, western Australia and central Africa also have large amounts of water available per person.

(b)Which parts of the world appear to have a small amount of water available per person?

Parts of North Africa,India, North America and parts of Asia all have small amounts of water available per person.

6. Observe the diagram of water use.

(a)Which are the main uses of water?

The main uses of water are for agricultural and industrial purposes.

(b)Which uses have increased more over the last century?

Use of water for community, industry and agriculture have increased more in the last century.

My field trip to the water treatment plant

As the bus rolled across the concrete bridge, I looked out of my window. A brown, trash-filled river greeted my eyes. I almost swore. This is what humans do to the rivers that supplied them with water for thousands of years? Fools. Water from this river 500 years ago was pure and safe to drink. Now it has to go through an expensive purification process for it to be considered safe. My class took a field trip to the AETRA water purification plant to see how water from this dirty river was turned in water to be consumed by the people of Jakarta. It was an interesting field trip, and at the end of it we got to taste the water. The purified water tasted like normal water and I couldn't believe that this water once had bacteria and other deadly germs that could have been fatal. This particular plant processes 5000 liters of water PER SECOND. Whoa, that's a lot of water!

How to purify water in 6 steps:

Step 1: Gather water that you are going to purify. Pass it through large, coarse filters to filter out large debris like cans and plastic bags. Pass it through a second set of fine filters to remove small debris like leaves and straws.

Step 2: Add minerals like iron and magnesium to make the water slightly cleaner.

Step 3: Add alum and stir it into the water. The alum will act like a magnet and draw together dirt particles to form clumps. These clumps are called floc.

Step 4: Pass the water through a bed of sand. This should remove the floc and further improve the quality of the water.

Step 5: Pass the water through more sand; 1 meter of it. The sand should be extremely fine. Add chlorine to kill any remaining germs.

Step 6: Add disinfectant and, once tested for e-coli(a type of germ that causes stomach cramps and,in some cases, death), send it to a reservoir. The water is now ready to drink! Mmmm. That tastes good!

 This is a video of me doing an "interview" with Richie Perry from the novel Fallen Angels. This project was fun, and I think I should recommend Stuart to Broadway, he's quite a good actor:) 

Poem Reading

This is a video of me reading a poem called Where Do All The Teachers Go? by Peter Dixon. The humor is 110% British, and took me a while to start laughing when I was rehearsing it. it's still funny, and the poem is from a book called Read Me and Laugh: A Funny Poem for Every Day of The Year.

D-Day, by Stephen E. Ambrose, is a superb book about the day that shaped the fate of the twentieth century- June 6^th 1944.

There are many questions that can be asked about D-Day (The day, not the book).  The most frequently asked- Why did D-Day even happen? That question has many answers. I’ll try to simplify it. On September 2^nd, 1939, Great Britain and France went to war with Germany because the latter had invaded Poland, an ally of Britain and France. World War Two had begun. From 1939-1942, the Wehrmacht, the German army, the Luftwaffe, the German air force and the Kreigsmarine, the German navy and submarine fleet, were the terror of the world. France fell, and the Allies, a coalition of forces that included Poland, the USA and Canada were facing certain defeat at the hands of the Third Reich. But the battles of Britain and El Alamein, Hitler’s first major defeats, saved the Allies and bought them much needed time. Allied planners and leaders knew that the quickest way to end the war would be an invasion of Europe, since the Japanese had already been virtually defeated in the Pacific. But which country to invade? France was chosen for two reasons: 1. With France liberated, the French Resistance could be organized into a full fledged army and support them in their campaign against Hitler. 2. France was right next to Germany. If the Normandy Breakout campaign (as the invasion came to be called) was successful, then the massive Allied war machine could invade Germany and force Hitler’s surrender.

My favorite part of the book was the chapter We Were Fairly Stuffed With Gadgets. It describes in detail the various ingenious if not strange gadgets the British divisions used on their beaches: Gold and Sword. The gadgets were named Hobart’s Funnies after the British Major General Percy Hobart, who invented these vehicles. My favorites were the flail tank, which was basically a steel drum attached to a Sherman or a Churchill tank with chains thrashing in front. The idea was that the constant flailing of the chains would set off mines in the tanks path harmlessly and the serpent tank, with would shoot an explosive-filled plastic “serpent” at enemy machine guns and mortar emplacements to provide a clear path for advancing infantry.

About the author: Stephen E. Ambrose (January 10^th, 1936- October 13^th 2002) was considered a great author. But he was accused of plagiarism in seven of his books and of false information in all of his books. Law states that an author who is using another author’s work in his or hers own book must put the passage(s) in quotes and put a footnote. Ambrose did only the latter. He said, “ I just want to know where the hell it came from” On other accounts, especially in D-Day, Ambrose was accused of putting false information in the text. One veteran said that when Ambrose described the C-47 pilots as cowardly and inexperienced  “ That he was wrong. My pilot was experienced, he had just never flown in such heavy flak fire before.”

This brings an end to this report. D-Day is a great book, and for aspiring WW2 historians out there, it is a must read.  

The Water Cycle

Evaporation: Evaporation occurs when the sun heats up a body of water, usually the ocean. The water then turns into gas, which rises into the atmosphere. Once in the atmosphere, it becomes clouds or fog. This gas is called water vapor. As seen in the picture, an example of evaporation is when you see thin wisps of air on top of the water if you live near a beach in the afternoon. This is evaporation in action. By evening, the temperature usually drops a few degrees and the vapor, which is warm by now, rises. Cool air takes its place and the evaporation process is ready to begin again.  Water vapor is pure and free of contaminants.

 

Condensation: Condensation occurs when warm water vapor meets a cold object and turns back into its liquid form. As seen in the picture, an example of condensation is when you take a cold drink outside on a warm day. Soon, you’ll see little droplets of water on the outside of the

glass. This is cooled water vapor. Condensation is the opposite of evaporation, and the water it generates is safe enough to drink. Condensation is used to generate water for human consumption as fresh water supplies dwindle.

 

Precipitation: Precipitation occurs when water vapor inside a cloud condenses and makes it heavy. The cloud’s elevation in the atmosphere is lowered and that is why before a storm clouds block out sunlight because they are so low in the atmosphere. The vapor inside then

becomes too heavy to be kept up and falls to earth in the form of rain, hail or snow. Sometimes, a very violent storm can occur which can threaten buildings and human lives, as seen in the picture.

 

Infiltration: Infiltration (no, not Special Forces infiltration) occurs when precipitation (rain) falls to the earth. The ground soaks up this water and that process is called infiltration. An example is when if you put a sponge in the rain, the water will fall on the sponge and the sponge will soak it up, as seen in the picture. Infiltration is what keeps wells and pumps supplied with

water. As the groundwater has traveled through layers of natural filters, when brought up to supply a household or a village it requires very little synthetic purification before consumption.  

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne is about a young German boy named Bruno. His father is in charge of a death camp in Poland at the time of the Holocaust. This posting forces the family to move from their old house in Berlin to a derelict, shabby house somewhere near Warsaw. Bruno sees Jews living on the other side of a barbed wire fence and processes things as a nine-year-old would. “ Why can’t I play with the boys on the other side of the fence?” “ Why are they all wearing grey striped pajamas?” “Why are they trapped behind a fence in the first place?” While trying to make sense of the changes around him, Bruno meets Shmuel, a young Jew. Everyday they talk, and the two become fast friends.

The book is written almost in the form of a diary by Bruno. The author uses the voice of the nine-year old protagonist very effectively – this made the book more interesting for me.

The ending of the book had a deep impact on me. At the end, Bruno along with Shmuel, sneaks into the camp using a disguise and decides to do a bit of exploring. In his disguise, Bruno is mistaken for a Jew, and along with Shmuel and a hundred other Jews, is forced to march to a gas chamber. They are locked up inside, and Bruno is naïve enough to think that the German officers are doing this to prevent everyone from catching a cold. Unknown to him, these are the last minutes of his life, and Bruno declares his friendship to Shmuel before they are both gassed.  This was really touching since Bruno had been educated to think that Germans were the Aryan (superior) race, and that all other races were inferior, especially Jews. This book really made me feel sad about how cruel the Nazis were.

The genocide that was committed against Jews between 1939 and 1945 is often referred to as the Holocaust. An approximate 6 to 12 million Jews, as well as others, such as homosexuals and Gypsies were killed in the Holocaust. The facts I found on the Internet were horrifying. Children, sometimes no older than five, were killed first because they were too young to work. Women were also killed first because they couldn’t work. Men were worked to death, and in 1944, French Jews were forced to construct German beach defenses in preparation for D-Day. A German officer described the clean up ritual of the gas chambers: “ Those who had not been immediately killed by the gas were staring at me like zombies, their skin deathly white with pink and green spots. They were bleeding from their ears and foaming at their mouths. It was a horrible sight.” Many German officers, sickened by Hitler’s laws of anti-Semitism, planned coups to overthrow the Reich. Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, who had been wounded in Tunisia, engineered one of the most famous coups. In Poland in 1939, Stauffenberg had witnessed SS officers shooting Jewish women in the streets. He was sickened by the sight, and staged a coup that failed. Stauffenberg ‘s story was made into a movie called Valkyrie, with Tom Cruise as Stauffenberg, which is one of my all-time favorite movies.

My SCUBA Diving Adventure

“So I can really learn SCUBA diving?”

I was at the bowling alley in Plaza Senayan and my 10th birthday party had just ended. I was getting ready to go home when my dad pulled me aside and said “Do you remember what I promised you when you were 8?”
I furrowed my eyebrows. I couldn’t remember the major events that had happened two weeks ago, much less two years ago. But then the memory came back to me like a long lost story. I was sitting down on the couch reading a book. It was a normal day for me except that my parents were getting ready for their first SCUBA diving lesson. When I had heard about it, I started whining.
“Why can’t I go?” I asked my dad.
“Because you’re not old enough.” he replied. “Law requires all SCUBA diving students to be at least 10.I promise on your 10th birthday I will set up SCUBA diving lessons for you.” The memory ended and my mind shifted to the present and I said “Yeah, I remember. What about it?”
“Well, it’s your 10th birthday, isn’t it?” Suddenly I got really excited.
“Did you call him?”
“I’ll call him now.” Him was Joi, my dad’s diving instructor. I was elated. I was going to learn SCUBA diving!

The first lessons were in Joi’s dive shop. I learnt basic hand signals to communicate with other divers underwater and I also learnt the name and function of every piece of equipment a diver needed to have. The next lessons were pool dives. We went to a huge Olympic-sized swimming pool and did practice dives. The dives were truly exhilarating, because when you’re down there, you feel fifty kilos lighter than you should be and for one blissful hour I was gliding across the pool with not a care in the world. More pool dives followed and although they were fun, I longed to venture out into the ocean and see nature’s underwater miracles.

My dream finally came true when Joi announced that we were going on an ocean dive at Kotok Island, just one of the thousands of islands that make Indonesia’s vast archipelago. The boat ride to the island took an hour, and when we arrived I was eager to get into the ocean, which from the pier looked like a calm blue sheet, stretching into the infinite horizon beyond. First I donned my wetsuit. This garment kept me warm in the sometimes cold waters of the ocean. Next I attached my air tank to my BCD or Buoyancy Control Device. I then attached air hoses, air pressure gauges and compasses to the top of my air tank. These were critical pieces of equipment, since they told me how much air was in my tank, where I was and they allowed me to breathe underwater. The last things I put on were my dive boots, fins and mask which helped me to swim and look at underwater life. I waddled to the edge of the pier and looked down. My dad, my friend Adri and Joi were behind me. I stepped off and plunged into the ocean. I panicked at first, but then I relaxed. I started to swim to the buoy that marked our descending point. Three splashes behind me told me that the others were in. I reached the buoy and waited for the others to catch up. When they arrived, I started descending using a rope attached to the buoy. When the rope ended, I let go and swam around the reef. Hundreds of fish swarmed around me. They came in different colors and varieties. It was fascinating to watch them. I lay down on the sand and stared eye-to-eye with a huge fish. After more exploring, I relaxed and leaned on the ropes. Joi motioned for the others to come to him. He was holding a starfish which was pentagon shaped and was the color of roof tiles. This is perhaps a game of catch that I will never forget. We threw the starfish to one another, until the air in our tanks was low. We ascended to the surface and I looked around and instantly knew that that there were more dives to come.And when they came, I would be ready.

Vocabulary Definitions

Seizure-noun- when your muscles contract but do not expand, resulting in a painful and sometimes fatal immobilization.

Knead-verb -to prepare dough for baking items like pizza and bread.

Swarming-noun- a large number of people or things moving together.

Venture-noun-when you go on a journey, uncertain of what's going to happen.

Illuminating-verb-to light up some thing, or to have a brilliant idea.

Hispanic-adjective-someone from Central or South America

Jittering-noun-small irregular movements usually associated with electricity. Also means nervousness as in "When I get up on stage, I get jittery."

Trepidation-noun-a feeling of dread, fear of what's going to happen in the future.

Dignity-noun-the quality of being worthy of respect and honor; behavior or speech that shows appreciation of the formality of a situation.

Virility-noun-the quality of being masculine.

n= noun

v=verb

Moby Dick is a century old classic by Herman Melville. The book is about a young boy named Ishmael who longs to go to sea and signs up for a voyage on the whaling ship Pequod. It seems like an ordinary trip until the ship’s captain, Ahab, announces his true plan. He wants revenge on the malevolent white whale that maimed him. Ishmael’s dream voyage becomes a terrifying fight for survival as they chase white Moby Dick across the world.
The one thing I liked about Herman Melville’s writing style is that it’s easy to understand the book. If you’re reading a book about war, it’s sometimes hard to understand the book because you’ve never experienced war, you don’t know what it’s like. Herman was on a real whaling ship before he became a writer so he made it easy to understand but at the same time “unputdownable”.
My favorite part of the book was when Herman described the gruesome process of extracting oil from a whale’s blubber. Since we don’t use whale oil anymore, I was interested in how the sailors of the 19th century earned their living. I learnt that very little of the whale- which is usually a sperm whale because it’s blubber has the finest oil- was wasted. The only things that were really thrown back into the sea were bones and other useless items like the whale’s teeth. Every other part had some useful purpose. For example spermaceti, a white, frothy liquid found in a sperm whale’s head, was used to make candles for cathedrals and it was also used as boot polish!
Moby Dick might have been Herman Melville’s greatest novel, but it destroyed his literary career. Critics hated the book, and Herman suffered from depression for the rest of his life. Born in August 1819, Herman was forced to work to support his family after the family business collapsed and his father died. He got a job on the whaler Acushnet. The captain was a cruel man and treated his men brutally, so Herman deserted the ship in the Marquesas Islands and lived with a local band of Typee villagers for a month. When he got home he had an incredible story to tell, thus his first book Typee which was a hit with the readers of New England. From 1849 to 1850 he was at the peak of his success, but after that his popularity began to decline. He wrote two novels, Moby Dick and Pierre before resigning from his job as a New York docks customs officer and lived quietly until his death in 1891. Only during the interwar years (1918-1939) did Herman Melville earn his place among history’s most famous authors.

Conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan

Conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan is a non-fiction book by Robin Doak. The book tells the story of these two wars and answers many questions about them. How did the wars start? When did the wars start? Why is the US even at war? The book lists the important battles and events, from the Persian Gulf War to today. It also lists the timelines of the Middle Eastern wars. I learnt that although 82% of the US supported US military action in Iraq and Afghanistan, now less than 50% percent think the US is winning. I agree with them.
The Iraq conflict started when, on August 2 1990, Saddam Hussein, leader of Iraq, invaded his neighbor, Kuwait. Saddam wanted control of the nation’s profitable oil fields. Saddam declared Kuwait part of Iraq. Days after the invasion, the US began deploying troops to Saudi Arabia. This was to prevent an Iraqi invasion there and to try to scare Iraqi troops out of Kuwait. The deployment – Operation Desert Storm - was a multinational mission. 39 countries contributed to the coalition of troops. After the coalition troops gathered, the UN issued Saddam a warning: leave Kuwait by January 15 or suffer the consequences. Saddam refused. On January 17, coalition troops waged war on Iraq. On February 27 1991, Kuwait city was declared secure. It had taken just 100 hour to drive Iraqi forces out of Kuwait.
The conflict in Iraq didn’t end there. Operation Iraqi Freedom started on March 20 2003. Many world leaders disagreed with Bush’s idea of once more going to war with Iraq but Bush ignored them because he thought that Saddam was hiding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and he wanted to find and destroy them. Although Saddam was caught and executed later, it wasn’t any easier to stabilize the young democracy of Iraq. Insurgents continue to attack coalition forces through terrorist tactics such as kidnappings, roadside bombings etc. In 2004, American rock trio Green Day published an album called American Idiot. The album criticized Bush for invading Iraq and causing thousands of deaths. This album is my favorite Green Day album. Today, more than six years on, U.S troops still are in Iraq and the country’s security situation is still dangerous in many parts of the country.
September 11, 2001 was a normal day for America. The day quickly turned to horror when nineteen terrorists hijacked four airplanes and flew them into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Days after 9/11, the US debated on what to do. Many were in favor of an immediate attack on Afghanistan, the country harboring Osama bin Laden, the man believed to be behind the 9/11 attacks. Others believed that now was not the time for war. On September 20, Bush demanded that the Taliban government in Afghanistan to surrender bin Laden and other Al-Qaeda leaders to the US. The Taliban refused, saying that they wanted proof that the Saudi Arabian was behind 9/11. On October 7, 2001 the US attacked Afghanistan. Operation Enduring Freedom began with a massive air bombardment of Taliban targets. On November 13, US forces overran the capital, Kabul, and drove the Taliban and Al-Qaeda out of power. They hid in the mountains which the US is still combing to find them.However, the situation in Afghanistan has not improved. There is an insurgency similar to Iraq, led by the Taliban that attacks coalition forces and makes the country dangerous and unstable.
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been raging on for several years. Muslims are being discriminated everywhere because many people think that to be a Muslim is to be a terrorist. Shah Rukh Khan, a famous Indian actor, was detained by immigration authorities in New York because he was Muslim. I think that these wars aren’t doing any good. Terrorist attacks across the globe still continue. I think America should withdraw its troops from the region and stop bloodshed.

I would like to tell you about a book called Fire Ice by Clive Cussler. Fire Ice is from the National Underwater and Marine Agency (N.U.M.A.) series or files, as Mr. Cussler likes to call them. Hero of the series is the courageous adventurer Kurt Austin. He heads the N.U.M.A. Special Assignments team. Kurt may look like an ordinary oceanographer but he capable of really walloping the power- hungry maniacs he meets on a regular basis.  Kurt’s sidekick is Jose (Joe) Zavala, a cool Mexican- American with quite an attitude. Joe loves making dry, humorless comments everywhere, even when he and Austin are in near death situations.

My favorite part of the book was when Austin and Joe were climbing up a ladder on a ship in the middle of nowhere. Suddenly Austin turns around and fires his revolver at Joe, but the bullet doesn’t hit him. Instead, it hits a Russian Cossack warrior who was holding a saber, ready to kill Joe. Austin lowered the gun and said to a perplexed Zavala “ That Cossack was about to cut you down to size.” I found this remark hilarious and I couldn’t stop laughing for two minutes afterwards.

A note about the author, Clive Cussler. Clive Cussler began writing in 1965 when his wife took a job working nights for the local police department where they lived in California. After making dinner for the kids and putting them to bed he had no one to talk to and nothing to do so he decided to start writing. His most famous creation is marine engineer, government agent and adventurer, Dirk Pitt. Dirk Cussler, Clive Cussler’s son, is the namesake for Dirk Pitt. He has assisted his father with writing the latest novels in the immensely popular Dirk Pitt series. Cussler's novels are examples of techno-thrillers where Cussler uses fantastic spectacles and far-fetched plots – like the plots of James Bond or Indiana Jones movies. As a real-life underwater explorer, Cussler has discovered more than sixty shipwreck sites and has written non-fiction books about his findings, which I might start reading next. He is also the founder of the National Underwater and Marine Agency (NUMA), a non-profit organization with the same name as the fictional government agency that employs Dirk Pitt. Dirk Cussler also plays an integral part in NUMA  - he is the President and his father is the Chairman, which I thought was pretty cool.

Important finds by Cussler's N.U.M.A. include the Carpathia, the ship famed for being the first to come to the aid of the Titanic survivors; the Mary Celeste, the famed ghost ship that was found abandoned with cargo intact, and the Manassas, the first ironclad of the civil war.

I discovered from Clive Cussler’s website that he is a Fellow of both the Explorers Club of New York and the Royal Geographic Society in London. He has also been honored with the Lowell Thomas Award for outstanding underwater exploration. Cussler's books are published in more than 40 languages in more than 100 countries with a readership of more than 125 million avid fans and I am one of the most avid ones!

I and Me Grammar Sentences

1. My friend and I went to the store.

2. Leonardo and I are mortal enemies.

3. Tessa and I are friends.

4. Me and Aditya went to the movies.

5. Me and my brother played at Timezone.

6. Me and my mother are fans of Green Day.

Fallen Angels

Fallen Angels is a fictional story about the Vietnam War by Walter Dean Myers. The story centers around 17 year old Richie Perry, a

high school graduate from Harlem. Richie is the narrarator and protagonist of the book. His alcoholic single mother cannot afford to send him to college and he joins the army to escape an uncertain future and is sent to Vietnam and during his year there suffers numerous harrowing combat experiences and tries to grapple with the meaning of war, heroism, good and evil. During his time in Vietnam, Richie befriends Harold “Peewee” Gates, a slightly arrogant black man also from Harlem who disguises the horrors of his experiences with comical bravado.
My favorite part of the book was when Peewee leaped out of a helicopter to save Monaco, an Italian squad mate, from certain death. I think this was very brave of Peewee, considering that the helicopter was already taking off when Peewee saved Monaco.
One part that had a huge impact on me was when Lieutenant Carrol, the leader of the squad, was performing a funeral service for Jenkins, another squad mate who had stepped on a mine while out on patrol. Carrol said that Jenkins was a fallen angel because army gets boy as young and as innocent as angels to fight wars. This phrase has stuck with me ever since.

Guadalcanal Diary

Guadalcanal Diary is the diary of Richard Tregaskis, a news correspondent landed with the Marines on the Japanese stronghold of Guadalcanal. Richard’s diary tells the story of the brave Marines who fought and died trying to capture the small but crucial island in one of the most decisive battles of WW2.
My favorite part of the book is........actually, I don’t have a favorite part. I believe that a book should be so well written that a reader’s favorite part should be the whole book. This was certainly the case with Guadalcanal Diary. One part of the book that had a tremendous impact on me was when Richard and another Marine walked up a hill and saw below them hundreds of dead Japanese and Marines. The sight was so horrifying that he threw up on the Marine. This scene really woke me up to the horrors of war.
On the Internet, I found out that Guadalcanal Diary was so well received in the U.S that it is now required reading for all USMC officer candidates because it spoke very highly of the camaraderie amongst the Marines. In 1943, Guadalcanal Diary was made into a movie of the same name.

Characterization

Star Wars: Rogue Planet Characterization
The protagonist I am characterizing from Star Wars: Rogue Planet is Anakin Skywalker because he is a very troubled boy and while reading this book I found many changes in Anakin’s personality. The author of this book is Greg Bear and I’m going to list three personality changes I found in this book. Not all of them are about Anakin.
While facing an avalanche of spikeballs, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin’s master, is rooted to the spot while Anakin takes command and says “These spikeballs aren’t going to hurt us! Whatever you do, Obi-Wan, don’t feel fear!” This shows a personality change because Anakin knows all too well that if he takes command of any situation bad things can happen.
While riding on an air gondola Obi- Wan sensed Anakin’s energy levels were too high and they were way out of his comfort zone. I was bewildered when I read this because I, like many other Star Wars fans thought that Obi-Wan was an adaptable Jedi who could adapt to any situation and in other books he does show this trait, but I had never heard of an “Obi-Wan comfort level” before.
While being chased by a bloodthirsty assassin in a trash tunnel, Anakin clears his thoughts and focuses them on defeating the assassin. This was also startling to me since Anakin’s thoughts are never clear and he relies mainly on Obi-Wan and the Force to guide him on a mission. To me the fact that Anakin got his thoughts under control is incredible considering that there is furious emotional conflict raging inside him.
I enjoy any Star Wars book but Rogue Planet was special and it’s a must read for any Star Wars fan. I find that Anakin’s personality has matured compared to the previous books in the series.