11/30/12

Today in human geography we continued to watch the video about Chinese economy. It told a lot of stories on several families/people. There was this one woman who was miserable in her marriage and planned to divorce her drunken husband after her daughter pursued the rest of her education and graduated college. She was an EXTREMELY hard worker and carried about 120 pounds of produce on her back. Her pay was about 3 dollars a day. Then there was another family who was rich. They bought only the highest quality of furniture and technology and they bought a sofa that had literally traveled around the world. There was also another family who was a family of four in Maryland. The father had returned back to China to start a company for a cheaper price than it would have been in MD. His company worked on making a cure for AIDS. We left off on learning about the "Bang Bang Man" and the difference of the Walmart in China verses the Walmart in America.

11/28/12

Today in human geo we continued watching the video on China and it's economy. I learned a lot of stuff that I would of never imagined would be possible that is just terrible. Like for example women who do hard labor almost all day, only get payed 1-2 dollars...A DAY. This one family only had 600 collected from working all year. 600 dollars...between the mother AND the father. FOR THE WHOLE YEAR. That's just crazy. And the men that worked labor all day only got payed 3-4 dollars a day. It was so irrational and sad. In the video the woman who was working with heavy labor and dangerous things had her daughter with her, and her daughter was helping with the dangerous job, because she probably couldn't afford day care. It is so sad. We also saw how this company had to shut down because the same company was in China and the Chinese company was doing better, and the original company in Missouri had to completely shut down and over 600 workers ended up losing their jobs. Some of them were close to their 70's for crying out loud! It is absolutely crazy.

hmmm

Working now!

11/ 15/12

Today we had our double mod period, which is SO long. Today it didn't feel as long as some of the other double mods in human geo but it was still pretty long. We went over over our homework, which was to answer a couple questions about a country that you and your partner assigned to each other, and we went over what we really need to know for the quiz on Monday. It was a pretty interesting class, and I was especially interested in a story that Mr. Schick was telling us about his friend that was Iranian. She and her family had been forced out from power in the Iran government and she was homeless for about a week until they moved to Oregon. I thought it was very interesting. Mr. Schick said she always had a back packed just in case it was safe to come back to Iran.

France

Declared Independence on July 14th, 1789.

The steps of France's independence were: Frankish tribes unified under the Merovingian Kingship, Western Francia established from the division of the Carolingian Empire, the French Monarchy was overthrown, the first French Republic was founded, and the Fifth French Revolution was founded. Mainly France was ALWAYS an independent country.

Brazil

Declared Independence on September 7th, 1822.


Brazil used to be attached to Portugal. After the Treaty of Tordesillas, which settled the disputes between Spain and Portugal land wise, gave Brazil its independence.

Afghanistan

Declared independence on August 19th, 1919.

Afghanistan used to be thought of as a "buffer state" between the British and the Russian empires. The International Security Assistance formed in Afghanistan to support an independent government for them. Afghanistan was kind of all over the place beforehand. There were Soviet Union and United States influences in Afghanistan.

11/12/12

Happy Monday! Today in class we went over the quiz we took last week. I received a much better grade than I expected. I got a B! I was so relieved I didn't fail it or anything. Mr. Schick interrogated Alex by having him repeat over and over "Achmidinijad". I probably did not just spell that right...well after that Mr. Schick told us about an upcoming 500 word essay on 2 countries of our choice. I am not very excited for that. I usually like to write essays but this particular subject does not interest me. In the middle of class there was a mini freak out because there was a stinkbug but Moh saved the day and threw it out the window.
P.S. - HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALICE AND WILL!

11/9/12

Today in class, which I am in right now, we had a pop quiz. I don't think I did that great but I am greatful that Mr. Schick gave us the privilege of using our blog as an aid. A lot of what I had really helped me in the quiz and I was happy I thought it was important enough to write down so I had it for the quiz. Before the pop quiz Mr. Schick gave us about 10 minutes to study. I ran upstairs to the second floor and grabbed my quiz that we took a couple of days ago and I used it to study. It turned out that the front of the quix was the exact same thing as the front of the quiz I was about to take. I used my 10 minutes study time to quiz Savannah King. It was fun...I guess. Well hopefully I did better than I think!

World Leaders

King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz (Prime Minister and king of Saudi Arabia)
> He has proved himself a good leader and an adjustable person because of all the titles he holds, such as: deputy of defense, king, prime minister, mayor of Mecca, commander of the Saudi Arabian National Gaurd, and many more leadership titles.
> He is good with money and balancing it within the government.

President Hugo Chávez(President of Venezuela)
> Has became apart of the olivarian Revolution and gained political skill.
> He was born into a working-class family so he grew up in politics and business.

President Dilma Roussef (President of Brazil)
> Suffered through hardship(getting tortured in prison) that made her into the strong person she is today.
> A good pragmatic deal maker.

President François Hollande (President of France)
> Is good with socialism (which is the government of France right now)
> He is one of the first presidents who do not have prior experience as a minister or Junior Misister so he is bringing something new to the France government.

President Enrigue Peña Nieto (President of Mexico)
> He is bringing back a political party that has worked for Mexico for over 71 consecutive years.
> He has had experience as a governor.

Chancellor Angela Merkel (Chancellor of Germany)
> She has stepped up to be the first woman Chancellor of Germany.
> She has held countless leadership roles in government and it has made her confident and politically smart.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (Prime Minister of Irael)
> Has held office once before.
> Is good at keeping peace with adversary countries.

Mahmoud Ahmadineiad (President of Iran)
> He was re-elected so he has an extra 4 years of presidential experience under his belt.
> He has an ultra-conservative side that can be vital in moments of his presidency.

Hu Jintao (President of the People's Republic of China)
> He was re-elected so he has experience and has learned from his early mmistakes as the president.
>He has made corruption a mandatory problem to work on.

President Hamad Karzai (President of Afghanistan)
> Attains a Masters deegree.
> He helped negotiate the defection of 500 of Dr. Najib's forces.

President Pranab Mukherjee (President of India)
> Has been a central figure in Indian politics for 4 decades.
> Is indeispensabl in India's coalition government.

Prime Minister David Cameron (Prime Minister of the United Kingdom)
> Has a quality education ever since grade school and was thought to be a kid progiy in academics.
> He sought to modernize the government of the UNited Kingdom and people were ready for change.

Queen Elizabeth II (Queen of England)
> She has conferred over 387,700 honours and awards.
> The Queen is a patron of more than 620 charities and organizations.

President Barack Obama (President of the United States)
> was re-elected. He won by 300 more electorial votes than his oppenent.
> was a lawyer, so he strongly believes in justice.

11/2/12

Mr. Schick finally came back! It had been like two whole days...way too long. He said he had (and still had) a sore throat and he just overall didn't feel well. He handed our tests back and we talked a lot about the midterms and the change from 1st quarter to 2nd quarter. There was a shadow in the class named Will I think. For most of the class we went over the assignment we had about the world leaders. We were given a country and the responsibility to research the leader, a picture of the leader, and the type of government. After that we kind of just chatted about more little stuff and Mr. Schick decided to have us change seats on Monday. I hope I sit next to Savannah King.