To be pig or to be cow, that is a question

           When I first turned the page of 'Different seasons' and saw the word 'shawshank', the first impression that I got in my head was 'hideous'. That word made me imagine the rat shrieking in agony while its body being clutched by the cat. It sounded very weird, and horrible.

           Not much different from my expectation, the Shawshank prison was 'weird and horrible'. Under the name of 'Happy Shawshank Family', prisoners live their life without much meaning. They are 'institutionalized'. Prisoners just get raped by 'Sisters' when they were 'fresh fish', just wait for their meal, and wander around the yard in the weekends. They reminded me the
meek cow who gets slaughtered. Without any squeaking or defying, they just obeyed to the reality.
           However, Andy was different. In the book, it is described that Andy didn't seem to belong to the Shawshank. He was not guilty in the first place, falsely accused of murdering his wife and his wife’s lover. Although it is not sure whether he was different from others because of his innocence, he was apparently unique from others. He was comparatively neat and quiet unlike others. He was somewhat 'outsider' in the prison.
           Not only his appearance but also his attitude towards the Shawshank society made him distinctive to other cons. Instead of obeying to the order, he always tried to fight back. He was the 'main character' in the prison. He was the prisoner who fought against Sisters, although he failed a lot. He was the only prisoner who became the financial counselor of the guards and wardens who are the men of power. He was the star of the prisoners, literally. (There wasn’t a single prisoner who gave beer to his fellow prisoners.) He was the librarian who put a lot of effort on expanding the library.
           Among a bunch of expressions to describe Andy that I mentioned above, the best expression to describe Andy can be ‘the pig that is going to be slaughtered’. Although he was not in the risk of ‘being slaughtered’ like a pig, his desire to do redemption was as strong as a pig. After he found a testifier, Tommy Williams, of his innocence to the crime, he constantly requested re-trial. No matter how many times he was rejected, he just continued to do it, again and again. And after that, without any depression, he simply dug the hole for an exit to the prison, simply with a rock-hammer and a poster to hide the hole. His desire to escape was ardent like a pig who constantly squeaks until it dies. The only difference between two is that the ‘squeak’ of Andy was mute.
           What I found from Andy was the power of hope. While digging the concrete wall, Andy would have thought a lot of things. He would have smiled when thinking about the success of redemption. But he would have been depressed when thinking about the failure of the redemption, ending up as a ‘slaughtered pig’. However, still, he chose to be a squealing pig instead of being a meek, obeying cow. He succeeded to escape, and left the letter that says ‘Remember that hope is a good thing. No good thing ever dies.’
           Yes. Hope is a good thing. Like the title of this novella suggests, hope springs eternal, not only to Andy but also to those who want to be a squealing pig in their life.

Which 'smart' are you?-Assignment #2

                'Number one: People say that I am very talented at sports.' Yes? Then, you might be a 'body-smart'. 'Number two: I enjoy using axioms, proverbs, and metaphors when talking.' Yes? Then, you might be a 'word-smart'. These are the example questions in 'multiple intelligence test'. Multiple Intelligence,MI is the theory which Howard Gardner established. It is the theory which people try to utilize for 'new education system', the education system that doesn't kill children's creativity. This theory can be the good news for people like Ken Robinson who are not comfortable about the current education system.
                Let's talk about the theories like IQ test. Before MI theory, when it comes to human intelligence, IQ theory was the dominant theory in the education field. A lot of schools and teachers tried to evaluate students' intelligence by IQ numbers. However, the real purpose of IQ test was to distinguish students' academic ability in school; whether students can follow the school study or not. Apparently, this purpose is far from 'human intelligence'; it only measures the 'logic' area of the children. But still, people tried to find the relevance between IQ numbers and the intelligence, and even, the success in adulthood.
                As it can be seen, current education system well fits to the 'IQ theory'. Similar to the IQ test which only measures the logical ability a child has, current system focus on only narrow range of numerous studies. According to Ken Robinson, education systems in all over the world have a same hierachy on subjects. Ken Robinson's lecture quoted:

At the top are mathematics and languages, then the humanities, and the bottom are arts. Everywhere on Earth. And in pretty much every system too, there's an hierachy within the arts. Art and Music are normally given a higher status in schools than drama and dance. There isn't an education system on the planet that teaches dance everyday to children the way we teach them mathematics. Why?

  Why? From some moment, students were required to put priority on math and language. From some moment, students had to believe that grade appeared in their report card equals to their intelligence. Is this a normal phenomenon?
               As the alternative method, MI was introduced. According to Howard Gardner, there are 8 intelligences; linguistic, musical, logical-mathematical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalist. And he says that all these 8 intelligences have equal claim to priority. It is quite attractive, and quite revolutionary to the current flow of education.
               Still, many people claim a lot of limitations that may appear when applying MI theory to education. First is related to the matter of 'time-efficiency'. As this MI theory has a weak evidence(just relies on hunch), it may lead to the waste of time. This is the problem that Gardner himself already admitted. And the second is that the application of MI theory is not realistic to this situation. As current society and the way of success are usually based on academic areas, pursuing MI theory may not be helpful for children.
               Yes, there are still a lot of limitations and problem that might occur when applying MI theory. However, this theory can be the key of solving current education system's problem. It is obvious that alternatives that have some limitations but can also solve the problem should be applied anyway.

Education system and my twin brother-narrative version

-this is the TED video titled 'Ken Robinson says schools kill creativity'

           While I was watching this video, I thought of my twin brother. This video explaining about the education system killing creativity is my twin brother Seyeul's story.

           'Twins' equals 'the same'? Of course not! Especially in the case of binovulartwin. Although my brother and I are twins, we are so different in many ways. I liked barbie dolls, pink, and love stories. My brother liked dinosaur toy, marine blue, and wars. I like watching dramas while my brother likes starcraft games.

          The biggest difference between us can be the presence of artistic talent. 'Soho as an artist' is not that realistic; it would be an exaggeration. But in the case of my brother, it is not. My brother does have a talent in drawing. He can remember (or imagine), draw and express the smallest detail like an eye of dragonfly. He was creative enough to draw up the whales which he never saw. (He got the first prize in the contest by drawing this) Not only that, he also enjoyed drawing. While he was drawing or making up soldiers, weapons, dinosaurs, his face was always full of smile.

          However, the 'education system' started to influence my brother. Academic subjects which are in the top priority (and in other words, which my brother had no interest) drove him crazy. He had to study, in reality memorize, a bunch of equations, English words, historical facts. He got a lot of stress from report cards with 'effort must be needed'.

          Not only my brother had to STUDY but also he had to change the attitude towards drawing. Instead of thinking drawing as a pleasure, he was forced to think drawing as a tool of entering better school. When my brother was a 6th grader in elementary school, he applied to 'Sunhwa Art Middle School'. That school was thought to be more appropriate for my brother's situation. There were several requirement for him however. Everyday, 9 hours of drawing boring things like sculpture. Staying in art academy starting from 2pm to 11pm. 2 hours of break time plus dinner time. Eating instant food or lunch box instead of eating 'table dinner' in home. It was such a torture for him. He always said he'll give up. But anyway, he worked hard to enter 'Sunhwa Art Middle School', as he wanted to enjoy drawing. Instead of entering that school, all he got was a notice that reported his failure indifferently. The reason was his comparatively low academic grade. It was not high enough to get into the school. And for the first time, I saw him crying, being depressed. For a long time, he tried to avoid art itself.

         To tell the 'epilogue', my brother went abroad, studying in Vancouver, Canada. It was his own decision. He really wanted to defy from oppressive educational system and find out more liberal school environment. Now he is regaining the hope. He got a new interest in designing, and got a definite dream of 'cell phone designer'. But still, he didn't forget that situation, (it is more accurate if said 'couldn't') the tragedy greatly affected by 'education system'.

Lord of the Flies-analysis in tone and perspective

When it comes to the novel, tone and perspective are very important as they can make story more effective. (According to the ‘Jamestown Literature, tone is the writer’s attitude toward a subject.) By tone and perspective, funny stories become funnier, scary stories become scarier, and touching stories become more touching. And in the novel ‘Lord of the Flies’, by using the 3^rd person omniscient perspective and objective, scary tone, the writer William Golding emphasized the theme.

           The perspective of ‘Lord of the Flies’ is the 3^rd person omniscient perspective. According to the ‘Elements of Language’, when the perspective is 3^rd person omniscient perspective, the narrator can present readers the thoughts and emotions of the characters directly, and tell readers thing that none of the characters could know. The narrator does not participate on the events in the story like the characters, but he just observes the situation. For example, in chapter six, when the boys were sleeping, the huge explosion or the small war happened. None of the characters know this fact, but only the narrator knows it and he tells this fact to the readers. He said, “There was a sudden bright explosion and corkscrew trail across the sky; then darkness again and stars. There was a speck above the island, a figure that hung with dangling limbs.” He describes the situation specifically which none of the characters know.

           And the tone is very objective. The narrator neither tries to get into the story nor to express his opinion about the characters. He is just a mere observer. He describes literally everything by just showing readers the dialogues of the characters or the action of the characters. For example, the narrator shows Jack’s savagery itself in order to depict the character, rather than directly stating the narrator’s opinion about Jack. The sentences like “You cut a pig’s throat to let the blood out, otherwise you cannot eat the meat”(Jack’s line), ‘Jack held up the head and jammed the soft throat down on the pointed end of the stick which pierced through into the mouth’ shows the savagery of Jack. Another example can be the scene when Jack hit Piggy and Piggy’s spec was broken. The narrator just simply said ‘Ralph made a step forward and Jack smacked Piggy’s head. Piggy’s glasses flew off and tinkled on the rocks. Piggy cried out in terror.’ He didn’t express his opinion about Jack, just letting the readers to judge Jack by themselves. But it is certain that the readers would reach to the similar conclusion that Jack is mean.

           Another tone of this story can be horror. As the story goes on, there appear numerous conflicts and they express the “lord of the flies” in children’s mind. The tone becomes darker and darker as the plot gets more elaborated. For example, the sentences “a flurry of wind made the palms talk and the noise seemed very loud now that darkness and silence made it so noticeable. Two grey trunks rubbed each other with an evil speaking that no one had noticed by day” show the darkness of the story. That ‘evil speaking’ or ‘darkness and silence’ makes readers have a slight feeling of horror. And another example can be the scene where Simon woke up after the meeting with ‘Lord of the Flies’. The sentences like ‘Nothing prospered but the flies who blackened their lord and made the spilt guts look like a heap of glistening coal’ or ‘The Lord of the Flies hung on his stick like a black ball’ also create the dark, scary atmosphere of the novel.

           In ‘Lord of the Flies’, the writer William Golding depicted the theme very well by using the third person omniscient perspective and objective, scary tone. It was very effective and these are some factors that contributed to make ‘Lord of the Flies’ masterpiece.










-This is the essay that I wrote related to Lord of the Flies

Autobiography-Last New Year's Day

I clearly remember the last New Year’s Day. It was right before I entered KMLA. I was excited and worried about that. How will be my roommates? What should I do if I have a conflict with them? And…what should I do to manage my sleep? So many questions not answered. It never ended, and I was little excited, but somewhat afraid of that uncertainty. And trying to get rid of that weird, new feelings, I just tried to enjoy the holiday; sleeping a lot, eating Ttuk-guk(떡국) and fried-rice cake a lot, doing anything that will apart me from those questions.

           It worked for some period, but it lasted until my cousin came. He didn’t come to Grandpa’s house often, for no reason (it seemed) he came at that time.

           It would be better to explain about that cousin. He is 33 years old-quite old as my cousin- and he works as a speech therapist. He is the one who nick-named me as a ‘scotch candy’ insisting that my face looks like that candy. (And everybody agrees with that. Geez!) He barely talks about his patients but he usually talks about his favorite idol Girl’s Generation and other feminine celebrities who are so-called ‘glamour’. (When I sighed about my chubby body, he recommended me not to go on a diet in high school as it makes my upper body poor.) Whenever I met him, he always talks about my ‘baby-era’; how he contributed to my hygiene status- he said he cleaned up my dung. After talking about that, he always asks me about my love life which I have nothing much to say. In brief, he is just like a boy.

           And when I first saw him at that holiday, I could draw up the serial events that would happen. Nothing much different from my expectation, he talked about my life nowadays, and asked and said about this and that. Is it true that KMLA students only use English? You can make a boyfriend in there, can’t you? Questions in a row. Exhausted.

           Then, another cousin (the younger sister of this cousin) gave me some advice about the life in dorm-school. She advised me to ‘keep my pace’ and ‘not to be easy person’. However, when she said not to be an easy person, that cousin said that being an easy person is not that bad. (He explained) It will make a surprise attack in grades later. Wow…tempting I guess? I was very entertained.

           However that excited mind disappeared when I tried to practice Hae-gum(해금). As I was planning to apply to Minjok Orchestra, I practiced some Min-yo(민요) and some songs. Almost every family members did a lot of compliments about it, except him. When I made some off-pitch, he laughed a little bit at it. Being embarrassed about that, my face stiffened. I couldn’t smile or turn it as a joke at that time. Noticing that I was embarrassed, he probated that there might be some people like him so that I better think of how to respond to them. However, at that time, I couldn’t hear all that probation, just ignoring his comments.

           My unpleasant feeling toward him didn’t melt until I left Grandpa’s house. I didn’t want to talk with him at that time, and after all, I forgot about that happening. We got over it eventually. He and I are constantly doing some calls and text-messages for some time. Well, now, I know that I was too sensitive about that. And I thought that all of his words were not that stupid at all. Although I am not sure whether being an easy person is good or not, but still, his mischievous words and actions had something to learn. I learned to be confident, quite forgiving to others. It gave me a lot of help in living KMLA life.

Thanks, I’ll bring you some bromide papers of Girl’s generation.







-An autobiography that I wrote in Mz.Choi's class

*Just for a bit of 'laugh' :) 
Okay...Start!!
          Before I start my story, I think it’s better to introduce myself. My name? I don’t wanna talk about that, I would just remain my mysticism. I want to be the best gambler in the world. I’m not joking, I really mean it. Since I was seventeen, I literally fell in love with the card.
           In order to prepare for my future dream, two years ago I went to Las Vegas, the meka of gambling. I thought I could train my ‘unpolished’ talent in gambling.
           I went to the dealer who was very famous in ‘dealing cards’.
“Can I help you?”
“Well...Yes I want to gamble.”
“Really?”
His attitude was scornful, his face was telling, ‘You? You, the small ugly Asian, can beat me? Haha! ’. I was very upset. I really mean it. I should not lose this game. I MUST WIN this game and scorn him saying “Haha! You, the little dealer, lost this game! Do YOU think you are the best gambler in this casino? I guess you’re not!”. This is THE GAME for me. I became very serious.
Okay! I’m ready! I put all of my money in the table to reveal my confidence. Huh! But it was not enough. The dealer was still stubborn; he was disdaining me. I’m pretty sure about that. I could not lose the matter of self-respect. Plus I have to remain to be a poker face during the game. So I decided to bring in the big guns.
I put out the ski goggles, the one that I brought for skiing after gambling. The dealer seemed to be overwhelmed. Yes, that’s it! The beginning was good. This shiny, big ski goggles would hide my eyes, distract the enemy, and finally help me to cream that stupid dealer.
The game started. Now I got all the conditions that I needed; my extraordinary brain, overwhelmed enemy, and my big, shiny goggles.
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
U-oh……..It’s not good….I kept losing my money. What’s the matter? Whenever I use poker face on bad cards, still the dealer bet a lot of money and I lose. Is some chicanery happening here?
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Well…I lost all the money that I had. What’s happening in here? I was shocked!
After losing all the money, the dealer, with a triumphant air, said,
“Hey! Thanks for your SHINING goggles. That one really fits on you.”
Why did he said that? I didn’t know.
And when I put off the ski goggles and looked at the goggle, I was able to see my face clearly. It was reflective.








-This is the humor story that I wrote in Mz.Choi's class

Carpe Diem!

Carpe Diem...It is often misunderstood as 'Enjoy this moment' but  its real meaning is 'seize the day'. It appears a lot in the movie 'Dead Poets Society', in the scene when teacher John Kitting(may be wrong spelling:)) gives an advice to his students.
Of course I felt this quote quite touching, I am feeling more and more precious after I became KMLA freshman. In KMLA, according to the 'name value' as a KMLA student, there are a lot of responsibilities and also a lot of tasks to do. It is very challenging. One minute, even a second is a gold in here. When surrounded by numerous homework or quizes waiting in 'next day', I sometimes feel very lethargic and gloomy. So instead of paying attention to this moment, I often imagine 'rosey future' that I want to live without putting a lot of effort; handsome boyfriend, nice house, myself enjoying the campus life.
But after reading this quote for several times, I reminded the importance of 'present'. As the name presents, this moment is a 'present' that is equally given to us. And I have a right to enjoy and use this 'present' effectively. While preparing for mid-term, I should also remember another quote ' A good plan, violently executed now, is better than a perfect plan next week.'

An entrance ceremony-candle light ceremony

Yesterday was the anniversary for the independence movement in Korea, called ‘Sam-ill-zzul’. And to commemorate Korean Independence Day, our school, KMLA scheduled its entrance ceremony on that day. Doing the entrance ceremony in that day is quite creative.

The moment that I cannot forget, THE moment that stays in my mind, was the candle light ceremony.

Our school’s symbol are two things; one is the ‘Rose of Sharon’, which is Korean national flower, and the other is the candle, which has a meaning of ‘sacrifice’; very patriotic. In the middle of the ceremony, we earned a candle for each person, lit it, and put it in the front of the gymnasium. During the ceremony, the headmaster calmly talked about meaning of these candles, while we, the freshmen, were holding the shining lit candles, which were full of soft but hot candle drippings. He told us that the meaning of this ceremony is to remind us of the spirit of sacrifice, like the candle that burns itself to make the world bright.

It was sort of ‘sacred’; I mean everyone was very quiet and serious. No one thought the candle light ceremony was just a meaningless ceremony. For us to be reminded of the spirit we should have, sacrifice and patriotism was very remarkable . While the headmaster was calling the students’ names, each and every one of freshman walked to the shelves in the front of the hall and put their candles on the shelves. Seeing my candle shining gently made me feel very proud. My wish, which is to have a happy, meaningful KMLA life, was shining inside my mind like that candle. There’s only one difference between an ordinary candle and the candle in my mind; the candle in my mind would never melt.

About myself as a writer

"I really want to be a writer!!I want to give a hope to children by writing a bright story:)"
This is my ambitious dream that I had when I was in elementary school.
At that time, for me, being a writer seemed so obvious. The reason was simple. I thought that there were only 10 jobs like teacher(which is my mom's job), salaryman(it is my dad's job), writer, and so on. And among those ten jobs, writer seemed to be the most interesting and enjoyable job. Expressing the mixture of sentiment, imagination, and sometimes logic into words and sentences! That's something that I wanted to try.
But when I thought 'writing' as something that I should earn money or get a prize in the contest, I started to get a lot of stress. Whenever I couldn't think of the subject to write, I was very depressed at young age. Kind of hilarious nowadays when thinking about that.
Well..as time passes, I started to look 'writing' differently.
"Why don't I write for my own pleasure?"
Then, everything changed.
I started to write my journal, something that I could comfortably do all my 'blah blah blah's. Sometimes I wrote about Everland that I went with my friends, something that I felt from TV documentary, and even the boy that I liked so much. (That 'boy' changed annually, directly affected by the change of grade and class) While writing my diary, that diary became my 'companion'. Not just writing down what happened that day, but also I wrote my feelings that I felt from certain events or even others. After I had a conflict with my parents or my friends, I just let out those experiences to my diary. Sometimes with nagging, explanations for excuses. While writing all of those, I could relieve my stress from those conflicts.
My journal writing continued until I entered KMLA. It was a new world for me. THE world of Honjung-bread, morning exercise, and roomates. It was fresh, yet too sudden. I spent 1 months adjusting to the new life, and rest of the first semester studying and playing. Journal writing was forgotten.
But recently, I started to write my journal. And I feel very comfortable when writing about my trivial but interesting events, some thoughts that I had from people or even from little plants.
Well, writing in a casual way is one of the strength that I have. But the weaknesses that I have can be some grammatical mistakes, word usage, etc. To improve those weaknesses, I'm planning to read a lot of articles from TIME magazine and english books. As I think that reading is very helpful in many ways, reading TIME magazine section to section can help me know how to write 'professional' essays and the current issues. Although I'm having a hard time reading English texts, but someday I believe I can improve that. Moreover, I want to write a lot. Like I'm doing now, I'll write my journal everyday and practice some articles. By practicing my plan, I could achieve my goal which is to improve and ENJOY english writing.
I'll post other writings that I wrote in first semester. I hope you enjoy!!^^