The Journey of a Thousand Miles Begins with One Step -Lao Tzu-

I chose this quote because even though a journey might be challenging and almost impossible to achieve, you must at least try and do your best. You should never give up and keeping on going and there will be greater chance you will achieve your goal. Having a go at something is still better than giving up and doing nothing about it.

Curiosity in Orphan Boy and Pandora

The African myth, Orphan Boy, and the Greek myth, Pandora, warn us that curiosity can often lead to unpleasant change. In the Greek myth, Pandora, Pandora couldn't bare with her curiosity and opens the box that Zeus gave her. Therefore, all of the evil things came out and spread across the world. In the African myth, Orphan Boy, the old man couldn't bare his curiosity and follows the Orphan Boy. When trust between the Orphan Boy and the old man was gone, everything that used to be wonderful died. Because of the old man's curiosity, even water dried away and the world was left with nothing. Curiosity made a negative change in both myths. This is fascinating because many things were discovered and created through curiosity. Curiosity can lead to a positive change in the world.

My Name

Unknown like a single leaf on a green meadow. Outstanding. Difficult for some to sound. Bright as my personality. Graceful as a crane. Kindness flowing everywhere. Full of wonder as cranes flying and dancing together. Like an unknown forest in the middle of nowhere. A song of pleasure. A fantasy.

When my mom was pregnant, she wished to have a good and graceful girl. So my parents named me as ‘Sun Hae.’ Like most of the Korean names my name has a specific meaning when written in Chinese letters; ‘Sun’ means goodness and ‘Hae’ means grace.

Since I was a baby, my ear and heart was well acquainted with my name. Mom and dad used to call my name with heart-felt love and other family members also called me with a lovely voice.

Sometimes people question about the meaning of my name; they may think it’s weird or beautiful and they may also make an unidentifiable face. Although these kinds of concerns on my name are none that matters to me, I’m always ready to explain the meaning of it.

I love my name which was given by my parent. And I think I should have a responsibility to keep my name in bright shape. I used to pray to my God for the sake of my name. ‘Sun Hae’ should be a devoted Christian and a compassionate girl at school and future lives to come.

Common Themes of Creation Myths

From the beginning of the human history, the curiousity of the existence of earth was driving people in chaos. Even now, people are still wondering how earth was created. That's how myths were made. 'The space of the universe was in the shape of a hen's egg. Within the egg was a great mass called "no thing." '-Chinese creation myth (Phan-Ku). This quote shows that in most Chinese creation myths, the universe had 'no thing' in the beginning, which is one of the common elements in many other cultures. Themes of 'from chaos or nothingness/void,' 'from earth-diving' and 'supreme creator who dies' are at the center of many creation myths, which is unusual because those countries with similar themes might not even have known each other. 'From chaos or nothingness/void' is a common theme both in Chinese and Japanese myths. Considering that China and Japan might not have known each other, it is interesting that they have a common theme. Other theme, 'from earth-diving' was shared between Native American Indian and Japanese creation myths. While thinking of the far distance of these two places, it also seems very strange to hold a same theme. The final theme, 'the supreme creator who dies-body gets incorporated into earth,' which was co-existed in the Chinese 'Phan-Ku' and the Autrailian Aborigine Creation myth is another amazing mystery despite of their rare communication each other. As shown above, from the ancient times, people liked to make a variety of different myths. However I, as a Christian, have a firm belief that our almighty God has created the universe and all things in the world as stipulated in the Genesis of the Bible.

'The Giver' Fishbowl Discussion

For humanities today, we had to expand on the fishbowl discussion our class had based on the book, 'The Giver.' We had a few good questions to discuss about, which were broken into two groups. One was about stirrings and the other one was about releasing. Here are my thoughts of what a release and a stirring means.

I think stirring is kind of like the beginning of puberty/adolescence. In Jonas's dream, he felt the wanting and need to be with Fiona, which obviously means that he likes her. With adolescence there also comes marriages and babies. I think the community made them take pills for stirrings because they want to keep the community perfect and nothing different, and if people start liking someone, they might not be focused during their work time and etc. Stirring is kind of like growing-up and when you start having crushes on a certain person.

I think releasing is some what related to killing because in the book it says that in the House of Old, they talk about a person's whole life time before they release them so it's like you're life is ending. When I read the book, 'The Giver,' I realized that people actually celebrated the release and was very happy and excited about. So, I think that maybe the community themselves might not know that being released is not a good thing. But, I am still not sure if others kill them or they naturally die.

I am looking forward to reading more of the book and finding more about the stirrings and releasing.

Octomom VS China's One-Child-Policy

In humanities class today, we had a discussion about if you agreed with the octomom or the China's one-child-policy. Each of us were given a post-it note and was told to stick it on a timeline-like line as to your thoughts about the octomom and the one-child-policy, and we were also told to write down our reasoning on the sticky note. I placed my post-it note almost at the middle but more towards the octomom. These are my reasons for my thinking:

First of all, I mostly don't agree with the one-child-policy because people should have rights to decide how many babies they want. Also, I don't think would give birth to octuplets or fourteen kids and almost all the people would just give birth to 2-3 babies, so the rule won't be that meaningful anyways. Therefore, I really don't think there's a point in making the rule.

Secondly, I mostly agree with the octomom because you have the right to have as many babies you want, it's just that you should also know that you will have to take responsibility with all of your children. Also, you should think about your future and if it'll be good for all of your children. I think that you should know that if you have like eight children, then you should love each one of them equally. But as I said before, if you know that you can take responsibility for all eight kids, then you have the right to give birth to eight kids or so on.

So, these were my reasonings of my thoughts towards the octomom and the China's one-child-policy.

Government Laws or Responsibility?

Yesterday in humanities class, we were given another six paged information to read. The subtitle above was my headline for the discussion. The paper given to read was mainly about a person named Nadya who gave birth to 14 kids! And also about other families with octuplets or sextuplets. We had the fish bowl discussion after, wether it was necessary for the government to give out a law about how many kids maximum to give birth to for some people like Nadya, who was interested in having babies since when she was twleve years old.

I don't think the government should give laws for giving birth because first of all, not all people are like Nadya, giving birth to 14 kids. I mean, people would be smart enough to know when to stop and even if they want to give birth to many kids, then they should know that it will be their responsibility.

Another reason I don't think the government should give laws is because people should have freedom as to how they want to live their life, but I think they should know what the best timing is because for example, Nadya, she doesn't have a job and she lives in a 3 bedroom house with the 14 kids including her previous 6 kids! I really suggest people should think about the right timing. I also think people should think about their future before their decision because even though they might want a lot of kids, it might not be good for the kids since not all of them can get the love needed.

So, these were my reasons as to why the government should give laws and why having 14 kids are not really necessary.