Paulina's feelings

In the play Death and the Maiden, Paulina is a victim of rape and the many actions that she has during the play definitely are derived from the rape incident. I did some research and tried to find out what victims life's are like after a rape incident, and what they are feeling. I found that many victims face post-tramuatic stress disorder. This is very relatable to the other stories that we have read. Many of the soldiers faced this, and its very common for someone to feel this way after and life crisis. Paulina seemed very stressed and uneasy in the very first scene when her husband was dropped of by another man. At first she didn't realize that it was her husband and fear came upon her. I found a website that gives information on how rape victims feel and ways to tell someone that you have been a victim yourself. This website listed three stages that a victim goes through, and they are, shock, denial and integration. I can definitely see how Paulina went through all of these stages in this play. She points out the denial stage when she talks about faking sexual activities with her husband. She wants them to feel different and real, but all she can think about is her past. I think its so important for rape victims to reach out and tell someone what they are going through because it is a very traumatic situation, and no one can go through it alone.

http://www.domesticviolenceservices.com/rape.html

Wars effect on children

In The Painted Bird, the narrator is effected greatly by the war going on around him. He has to escape and ends up wandering from village to village just trying to survive. Luckily he comes along some people that give him a place to live and food to eat. Although in not all of these situations he is lucky. He witnesses many things that he wouldn't otherwise have witnessed at his age if a war hadn't been going on. Some of the things he witnesses include a women and children being raped (177), he was used in a sexual way (145), and he also witnessed the killing and hanging of men (183). All of these situations are examples of things a "normal" 8-10 year old boy wouldn't normally see. All of these situations were effects of war. THis narrator isn't the only child who and still is effected by war. In They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky, some of the boys faced situations just like this, and maybe even worse. I was interested in what kind of effects these situations had on children. I found an organization who tries to reach out to these children who are traumatized by war, and its called Children and War Foundation. Not only does this foundation help with providing children and families material things, it also helps them deal with symptoms they have developed, like post traumatic stress disorder. I provided a link that leads to their website, which gives much more information about them and ways that you can help.

http://www.childrenandwar.org/

Surviving WWII

As we see in The Painted Birds, the narrator goes through many horrible situations in order to stay alive and even stay hidden. Although this particular story may or may not be completely true, I do think that the author is trying to make a point. I feel that even if this is a work of fiction for the author, these same situations could have been happening to other people/children in Poland during the war. I believe that he is just trying to draw attention to that because many people do know what happened to the people who were captured and put in concentration camps, but little is known about the ones who moved from village to village to stay hidden until the war was over. I wanted to learn a little more about people in these situations. I did some searching and came across a book, They were just people: Stories of Rescue in Poland during the Holocaust, by Bill Tammeus and Jaques Cukiekorn. This book was written in 2009 documenting some of the stories of people who survived in Poland. I also found a link to a video of a woman who describes some of the things she went through while she was in hiding. I just feel that it is important to realize that even if the book is true or not, people still went through hard times and they should be recognized for their stories.

video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRbam0owuI4

book preview: http://books.google.com/books?id=PUslvs8kT_YC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22OCLC317623464%22&as_brr=3&ie=ISO-8859-1&cd=1&source=gbs_api#v=onepage&q&f=false

South Sudan today

After reading They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky I was really curious as to what was being done in Sudan today, and I was sure hoping some things has changed. In the epilogue Judy Bernstein talked about what the International Rescue Committee was doing. So I went to their website hoping to see what was occurring in Sudan. In January of this year South Sudan seceded from Sudan and became its own country. In 2005 a peace agreement was signed and that brought and end to one of Africa's longest wars. I was so glad to read this. Its hard to read about these horrible stories of these young boys walking for years and nearly starving to death, but I'm so glad something is now being done. Since South Sudan has become its own country they are completely rebuilding themselves, and the IRC is trying to help out in the efforts as much as possible. So there is light at the end of this dark dark tunnel!

I also saw that the IRC is helping so many other nations in the world who are going through some of the same struggles.

http://www.rescue.org/where/South_Sudan

Tribal Markings

In They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky, Benson has to go through a horrible event in Dinka culture. As part of this tribe's culture the people had to have their lower six teeth removed. They didn't necessarily have to but the girls who didn't have them removed weren't allowed to marry a man with a lot of cattle. And the boys who didn't have them removed were unattractive to the girls. They would say, "You aren't a man. You haven't endured the pain of manhood," (pg. 42). This was a main part of the Dinka culture and Benson was required to go through this painful process. He describes it in great detail and it is very disturbing. They pull out the children's teeth at a very young age, usually between six and twelve, because it is said to be easier and less painful.

The Dinka performed the removal of their teeth not only for their own benefit, but also to distinguish themselves from the other tribes, who would bear different marks and scars on their body (pg. 42). I found this very interesting so I found a website talking about the different scars that the tribes in Ghana had. They weren't only for differentiation but some were for beauty and others for medical purposes. These seem like very painful processes but are a very important part of African culture.

http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Ghana/Northern/Tamale/blog-243868.html

Cambodia compared to America

Before reading The Road of Lost Innocence I truly didn't know much about sex trafficking or even prostitution for that matter. All that I really knew was that it was a horrible thing and I never thought sex trafficking was such a big deal in America. Whenever a subject like this was brought up it was usually always talking about it occurring in a different country. So I was doing some research about what is going on here in America and found some interesting things.

In many ways the same things are occurring in both countries. The average age of girls going into sex slavery is between 12 and 14. Many of the girls in the U.S. meet a guy who then convinces them that life with him would be much better than their life now. This is where the sex trafficking begins, unlike in The Road of Lost Innocence where they are enslaved because they must pay off a debt. In both Cambodia and America, there are manipulative men who find these girls and do horrible things to them that will change their life forever. The lasting effects these situations have on the girls, are incomprehensible, and the girls will never feel the same or even trust anyone again.

I found this article interesting. Its by a woman who went through this as well, and she hits on a lot of the topics we talked about while reading The Road of Lost Innocence, for example addressing why they just didn't escape.

http://www.womensfundingnetwork.org/resource/past-articles/enslaved-in-america-sex-trafficking-in-the-united-states

Sex Trafficking

I personally didn't know much about human trafficking and much less sex trafficking before I read either "Fattening for Gabon" or "The Road of Lost Innocence." After reading these I have become very interested on how it all takes place and why it was such a popular thing to do. Especially after reading the first part of "The Road of Lost Innocence" I was completely shocked at how everything happens and what horrible situations the author, Somaly Mam, is put through. It makes it so much horrible knowing that this is a true story and that this has happened and is continuing to happen to girls today. It really hit me after reading this sentence in the story, "Imagine how many girls have been raped and hit since you started to read this book," (60). I was extremely interested in learning more about this sex trafficking and the different things that happen to the girls, and even what is done today in order to protect girls from having to go through this torture.

In Cambodia it seems like there is still a huge problem with prostitution. There have been a few laws laid out but like the article I found says, many government officials are involved in prostitution and brothels so not much is being done. This is causing an increase in diseases and many other problems within the country.

http://www.uri.edu/artsci/wms/hughes/cambodia.htm

Language

In the short story, "Fattening for Gabon" I feel that the use of different dialect plays a huge role. At times I really didn't like all the dialect because for me it was quite hard to understand. I think a lot of the words used were French which I don't know much of. This made me pay more attention to the reading and I definitely think it helped me understand the importance more. Languages can show so much about a person, and are definitely a huge part of world literature. For example in "Luxurious Hearses" the languages were very important and showed the difference between religions. I feel the same about this story. The languages in "Fattening for Gabon" show somewhat of a social status. The less educated would speak in an ungrammatically correct way, where as the more educated would be more proper. Yet at the same time I feel that the languages get somewhat mixed and integrated together. I wasn't sure if that was the authors doing or if that is really how it happened.

This led me to think about America, and what it must have been like when all of the different people and cultures stared to settle here. There must have been a huge array of languages spoken and it was probable very hard to understand everyone and communicate well. With all the different languages I'm sure it was common to mix and add words from the different languages together. I think that is a huge part of our culture today, because in our English language we do use words from other languages as our own. I just feel like this is a great way to show world literature. And I'm sure that this was intended by Uwem Akpan (the author of "Fattenint for Gabon") and I just feel like it is very interesting. I feel like different languages are so important because they show us and help us learn about the different cultures throughout the world. So that is why I feel that it was very important for Akpan to put in so much dialogue.


articles about why language is important:

http://www.dirbull.com/articles/benefit-of-different-languages-46.htm
http://www.suite101.com/article.cfm/redefining_education/98446

Women

I find it interesting that in "Luxurious Hearses" the women are portrayed in such a different way, at least by Jubril. In all of the other stories we have read, women are more sexualized. They are something to fantasize about, whereas in this story it seems to be the complete opposite. I believe this is mainly because of the religious and cultural differences. To Jubril it was so strange to see all these women on this mode of transportation. In his Muslim culture in Khamfi it was "not even permissible for a man to give his wife, daughter, or sister a ride on his bicycle," (194). Yet something so simple he was having a hard time dealing with it. In the Muslim culture it seems that the women didn't have many rights and that to sexualize them was a bad thing, they were treated more like slaves. Yet at some point I feel you could say this about the women in the other stories, I feel like its different because of the fact that this was a religion and way of life. Whereas in the other stories, it was a choice that the men made to sexualize the women. I just find it interesting to compare the way women were looked at and treated in the stories we've read so far. I also felt like I didn't know much about the Nigerian culture so I looked up information about it and learned not only about the roles that the women had but also about different cultural differences between the groups that lived in Nigeria. This brought me to a better understanding of why Jubril felt the way he did on the bus and it much more sense.

http://www.everyculture.com/Ma-Ni/Nigeria.html

Emotions Paul and soldiers today face

"I imagined leave would be different from this. Indeed, it was different a year ago. It is I of course that gave changed in the interval.... I find I do not belong here anymore, it is a foreign world. Some of these people ask questions, some ask no questions, but one can see that the latter are proud of themselves for their silence.... I prefer to be alone, so that no one troubles me. For they all come back to the same thing, how badly it goes and how well it goes.... Formerly I lived in just the same way myself, but now I feel no contact here." (pg. 168)

When Paul first finds out that he gets to go on temporary leave he is quite excited and ready to leave the war scene for a little while. This is of course how any solider would feel in this scenario. Once he returns home he actually realizes how much the war has affected his thoughts, his personal emotions and even the emotions he feels towards others. This is where the above text comes into play. Before coming home Paul imagined it so much differently and then when he got home he was disappointed. He came to the realization that the war has played a huge part in his life. He’s seen things no back home has ever seen and he is forever changed. He doesn’t know how to talk about what the war is like, so he decides not to even try. Bottling up your emotions is one the the worst things that anyone could ever do. You will never get any sort of relief unless you vent to someone about your problems. Its extremely hard to do, especially if the person your talking to has never experienced the things you have. But it is still so important and crucial.

This is what many soldiers that are coming home from war today are facing. Its called post-traumatic stress disorder or PTSD. This is basically a type of anxiety disorder that is brought upon someone when they experience a traumatic event. This article does a good job of explaining it and how it is affecting our soldiers. http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/141375/20110504/post-traumatic-stress-disorder-on-soldiers.htm. I feel that this is exactly what Paul is going through. One of the symptoms of PTSD is avoidance of discussing the event. This is exactly what Paul was doing when he was coming home. So I truly think this is what Paul had and its so great that we have finally figured out why and what makes a soldier feel the way they do after they come home from war. They have served our country greatly so we need to appreciate them and help them get back to as much of a normal life after they return home from war as possible.