Reflection~ Nuremburg

Overall, I thought this movie was very well done. It depicted the trials pretty much like I imagined them. The actor who portrayed Hermann Goering played the role very well. I honestly grew to hate him. It appalled me to see him in court simply talk casually about the things he did to the Jews and the plans he made as if they were no big deal. He acted as if he was definitely not going to be proven guilty. I liked how the movie added a little twist with the fight in the courtroom turning into a personal battle between Justice Jackson (played by Baldwin) and Goering (played by Cox). It made the plot not so historical and more dramatic. It was nice that there was some romance too. Elsie (Jackson's girlfriend I think?) was supportive of Jackson through the whole film and encouraged him to work his hardest through the trial because she said that "he believed the strongest in his opinions more than anyone else." I'm really glad that in the end justice came through, even though Hermann eventually ended up jus tkilling himself instead of having his rightful punishment. I also liked that one scene, that you(Maz) pointed out, in which one of the woman who was being asked questions was fearless in front of the defendants of war crimes. That made the whole scene 10 times more intense. I would say the acting was the strongest aspect of the film. I was impressed. :)

Reaction to Course

Well, I made it. And surprisingly, I don't feel as if a lot of material was learned again, or that concepts of history weren't overwooked, and I think that's because I've come to love history a lot more than I used to. AP European History has definitely made me a stronger student. It's definitely not your typical AP class, with basically just tough tests and projects, and making kids not want to do the work. I really liked how your projects were fun to do. When I was doing your powerpoints, I'd feel satisfied with myself because as I would rehearse what I would say for presentations, I would be learning about interesting things at the same time. And the material was sooo interesting. I have always been a history person, not American history or gov't history, but European or world history. Sometimes I would get excited when I would learn something funny, for example Louis XIV, like the fact how much he ate for breakfast. Little details we read like that amused me, and sort of made the experience.

I'm also pretty glad about the fact that you would assign lots of presentations. They were, and still kind of are, the bane of my existence, but your class has helped me improve a LOT in them. People said I have been saying "um"s a lot less, I don't look as nervous, and that I sound as if I know what I'm talking about. The last one really makes me happy. I know that once I get to college I should be close to a pro at presenting, (and I still have more than a year to college anyway) so I feel like your class was ideal for my preparation.

Some people asked me why I took the AP course when I took the Honors last year. I know it seemed silly to people, but I think it was smart of me because the stuff we went over again, was basically like reinforced in my memory. Reading the Power of One again was pretty cool too. The tests in AP were definitely tougher than the ones in Honors. I have never been a good test taker, and I can never help being nervous. I definitely had those days in which I was so stressed, I totally bombed the test, but I took those as lessons and just studied harder the next time. My failures really did motivate me and eventually I gradually got better.

Overall, I feel as if my high school education would really be incomplete without your two classes, Maz. Thanks a lot for the experience!! :) :)

And I'm really looking forward to Meeting of the Minds! Being Princess Diana is going to be fun, I've always loved her. It's going to be funny seeing everyone dressed up, too.

Chapter 30 ~ Connection Across Time

Like I have said before, I wish I could say things have improved in our world, relationships between countries wise, since the past century and a half. The Cold war was basically a continuation of political tension and military conflicts in the world, specifically America and the Soviet Union. I think the most central conflict of the war was the division of Germany. Something I think is crucial to know is that in 1993, President Bush said that Reagan "helped make ours not only a safer but far better world in which to live. And you yourself said it best. In fact, you saw it coming. We recall your stirring words to the British Parliament. Here were the words: "the march of freedom and democracy . . . will leave Marxist-Leninism on the ashheap of history.'' Few people believe more in liberty's inevitable triumph than Ronald Reagan. None, none was more a prophet in his time. Ronald Reagan rebuilt our military; not only that, he restored its morale."

Chap. 30 (Cold War) ~ Art

The 1st picture is obviously a cartoon, and it seems drawn kind of in a crude manner. It depicts secretary of state George Marshall's economic aid plan, the Marshall Plan. It was refused by many, particularly Stalin, because he wanted to communism to remain as powerful as it was. One can see in the cartoon that it is the american taxpayer doing all the work and the European sitting on the bicycle, not doing much besides pedaling, and the bicycle is self supporting itself. I think that this is basically saying that everyone had to start self supporting themselves under the plan, and by the expression on the mens' faces, they don't seem too thrilled. They kind of seem possessed, controlled. Thus, even Stalin is overlooked by many as evil(I still think he was), he was also smart and cunning.

The 2nd picture honestly makes me feel depressed. I think it really depicts very well the conditions of Europe after the Cold war. Uncle Sam looks defeated, deprived and is wounded. I think that clearly represents America wanting to not be involved anymore. And why would it not think that? Everyone around the world at the time thought that Europe was done for; that's how bad it was.

The 3rd picture was really painted by an artist during the war, whose name was Georg Baselitz. One wouldn't really guess that this painting has anything to do with the Cold war, but I think that is because not many people are aware of how bad it was for civilians. The painting shows mangled bodies, blood, ashes, and I think pieces of wired fences over the pieces of flesh.

Chap. 29 ~ Connection Across Time

I can honestly say, that since the 2nd world war, conditions of relationships between countries have not really improved. I wish I could say that since Hitler, Mussolini and Stalin have been dead, there have been no dictatorships, and that is entirely false. Today, there are many dictatorships evident in the world today, including the well-known Kim Jong-Il of North Korea. It's amazing, we're in the 21st century, and there are still people suffering from living under totalitarian governments? We should honestly be way farther than that. I would also like to say there have been no genocides since the Holocaust. Unfortunately, that is not true either. Even though the Holocaust is basically the only genocide that's EVER discussed in schools, there are many other genocides prominent today, if you read and research enough. I believe what it occuring in Israel is a genocide, and that the Palestinians should rightfully have their land back. It's just not fair to see the Israelites come back and say, we want our land back. God gave it to us! Well, many people around the world are sadly on Israel's side. But they don't think to put themselves in the Palestinians' shoes. How would you feel if someone left their land, it was unoccupied, so you took it for yours, and the previous owner comes back saying, this is my land. Yeah, you would tell them to get out! That is how the Palestinians feel, and I pity them. Like I have said countless times before, I really wish peace could be accomplished, but it's not going to be anywhere in the NEAR future.

WWII & Dictatorships Art

As many people know, Hitler was one of the main dictators of WWII. He had this hunger for power and such distinctiveness in his voice during speeches, that it was impossible during the time of war to not know about him. This first image shows Hitler shouting, as if he's giving one of his speeches. His body is transparent, one is able to see his ribs and spine, with a strap that seems to be part of a military uniform going diagonally down his chest, and a swastika symbol on his chest as well. There are coins piled up in the bottom of his stomach. I think all of this symbolizes a great deal about him; he basically lived on being a dictator, meaning he was obsessed with power and would do anything to be at the top. He wanted all Jews eliminated, and that's the reason for the swastika. The coins represent the fact that Hitler was aware of the Jews' power to get money, since they were and still are known for their intelligence (stereotypically). This is one of the genuine reasons he hated them so much.

The 2nd picture honestly brought tears to my eyes. I hate the thought of so many women having their husbands leave them and their families during an already suffering period of time in history. It was a tough time for women overall; not only husbands, they lost brothers, sons, fathers, etc.

The 3rd picture is not exactly a form of propaganda, but more of a way to show the civilians of America that, in war, they are becoming "mightier." Basically what I'm trying to say is that at that point,what many wanted was just to eliminate the opposing side in the fight, and many would just throw aside the fact that millions of innocent lives would be lost. The important thing was to get stronger military-wise, and I find that simply sad.

WWI, why it still matters (article) ~ Reflection

It's amazing to think that an event that occured so many years ago, still affects us today. Before taking this class, I knew that WWI was one of the bloodiest conflicts in history. I mean abviously not as bad as the 2nd World War, but you get my point. One major thing I learned was that it was supposedly, a "war to end all wars." And it obviously didn't turn out to be one. The Treaty of Versailles, which did technically end the war, still left a lot of damage unrepaired. First off, Germany was left to pay the whole cost of the war. At first, when I read this, I felt happy inside, because of how the Germans and Hitler treated the Jews. But then I considered how much they owed, and then my eyes were opened. No country should be forced to pay that much, that's basically insanity. Germany's condition was already rough enough. Two wrongs do not make a right. Another major thing I learned was that a few countries lost a lot of their territories. For example, Germany and the Ottoman Empire lost their colonies or possessions outside of Europe. And they were turned into "mandates" by the League of Nations. Speaking of mandates, the British Mandate for Israel included what is known as Israel today, Jordan, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. This reminded me of our Palestine Israel Conflict discussion in class, and the powerpoint presentations. What the mandate included led up to an agreement in 1993 between Israel and Palestinian leaders, granting the Palestinians some control of the West Bank and Gaza, in hope of a new Palestine state. But there has been no progress. That's what the mandate led up to; false hope. At least Obama has promised that he is going to do his best to make the tensions between Israelites and Palestinians go away. Sadly, I feel not much is going to improve...

Reflection~ Friedman Video

Okay so, today I was thinking back about what we had done in class the past week, and I remembered the video. I wasn't originally planning on blogging about it, but now I feel the need to. This video was very well done. Thomas Friedman, who is an award-winning American journalist and author, traveled to Europe post 9/11 to see how America's reputation had declined. I have always known that most Europeans aren't that fond of us, and that was usually because our mannerisms are different than theirs' (generally speaking). I know one of the main things that annoy them is how blunt and opinionated we are. This video gave me a few surprises. Friedman was talking to one of the students from America studying in Paris, and she told him that once the US invaded Iraq, she had gone through some verbal harrassment from the French. They said things to her such as, "Do you have any idea what your country is doing!?" or "What kind of people are you!" as if she represented the American nation as a whole or something. I never knew the French could be like that. I know that in America, if France were to do something outrageous and a French person were in our country, it's not common here for people to be like that. Overall, we are friendly people. Another thing that appalled me in the video was the interview Friedman had with the Muslim French women. They seemed to have some Arab background, but they spoke French fluently. When asked what their views are on bin Laden and the Al-Qaeda attack, shockingly, they replied that they believe he was doing the right thing; he was "fighting for Islam." Okay, first of all, this doesn't look good on a video because it reflects on Islam as a whole. I'm Muslim, and I felt uncomfortable immediatly. Second, fighting for Islam?? A religion doesn't need to be fought for. Just believe what you choose, period. That whole interview just bothered me. I'm sure it gave at least a few other people that watched it the impression that a lot of Muslims around the world think that, and that's not true. Sure, we don't see bin Laden as badly as Americans do, but it's not to the point that most of us support him. Overall, I learned a lot from the video and hope that America's reputation improves over time around the world.

Reflection~ Korea Article

I have always known that Kim Jong Il, the dictator of North Korea, is notorious for being one of the worst leaders in the world. I have never really thoroughly studied about North Korea at all, but wow, this article came to me as a total shocker. Few cars and factories? What makes North Korea this way, while South Korea is becoming more and more modern? The island of Korea isn't too far from the PRC, or Japan; which are both prospering in technology. The few factories that are present in Japan, make mostly just military equipment. Poverty is still very prominent. Kim Jong Il is basically just focusing on making his nuclear power iron strong, and play "cat and mouse" with the west. Since the end of WWII, North Korea has barely progressed. When Japan was defeated in 1945, the 38th Parallel line was formed, spliting the Korean peninsula. It wasn't really supposed to last.. but then Kim Il Sung became obsessed with forming his own strong army, and being a dictator. What is it with people and their thirst for power?? Like many other leaders who became obsessed, he swung North Korea between his own type of democracy and authoritarianism. Building a strong military, North Korea managed to seize an American ship, the Pueblo, and imprisoned the crew for nearly a year. While America was trying to make peace with North Korea and make negotiations, North Korea wouldn't budge, pushing itself only further into solitude. That is how it didn't benefit from all the technological advances made in the many countries surrounding it. Not really paying much attention to how his country was lacking progress, Kim Jong Il, started paying all of his attention to nuclear weapons, and how much he can get his hands on. He started to reconsider his country's complete isolation when over 80% of his people were starving from the huge famine in mid-1990s. Today, conditions aren't much better for the North Korean people, as the Northerners and Southerners are technically still at war. So today, the new leader, Kim Jong Un has taken over. I don't get a very good feeling that he's going to do much for the country either...

Reflection~ Ppt 4/29

My partner and I collaborated on a project, and its topic was The Tibetan Crisis and the Dalai Lama. Considering I had never even heard of the Dalai Lama before, and knew very little about Tibet, I thought this would be a good topic for me. Basically, all I knew about Tibet before starting the project was where it is located. Since I was more interested in the Tibetan Crisis, my partner and I split up the research, and I focused on learning about what was going on in Tibet. I found various articles on Tibet's situation, and basically I first and foremost learned that China claims itself the owner of Tibet. I looked at a bunch of maps and saw that, yes, Tibet is shown as if it is a part of China. But at one point, Tibet was fighting viciously for its independence. Around 50 years ago, China successfully invaded Tibet's region of Kham and took over Lhasa, Tibet's capital. While my partner was doing most of the research for Dalai Lama, I was meanwhile learning about it myself. I figured they were the leaders of Tibet; I read that by 1913 the 13th one was in reign. China had always thought it was the rightful owner of Tibet. The UN didn't even think to help Tibet and its fight for independence, which is ironic because it was supposed to be supporting peace among everyone. Either way, things today are a little better. Something I find really unadmirable about China was its Seventeen Point Agreement, in which China promised it would help Tibet have progress economically and socially. Sadly, none of that ever happened. Tibetans were treated quite cruelly by the Chinese, and some compared it to Nazi Germany. Overall, 86,000 Tibetan lives were lost. Today, the rage has turned into hopelessness, which basically implies that even the Dalai Lama is willing to make compromises and give up the fight for independence. However China's ego won't budge. So what's next?