Graham Rawle is the author of the book: ‘A Woman’s World’, which its layout is made from cutouts of books, magazines, newspapers and others similar to them. It tells a story of a woman, who is actually a crossdressing man, living in a city, as a woman would.

In the ‘project’, we had to use magazines and newspaper cutouts to tell a story, about anything we wanted. Being me, I decided to make a short story about the Loch Ness Monster. (You can already tell how my year in English is going to unravel…)

I believe that ‘A Woman’s World’ isn’t a foundational story itself, but its a foundational WAY of TELLING a story. Does that make any sense? It is the first book (to my knowledge) to have cutouts of different things stuck together to make a story, taking bits and pieces from all over the place and putting them in a different order, creating something entirely new.

I’m still not entirely sure.

This speaker, Sabrina, had been diagnosed with cancer at the age of 26, which was not uncommon in her family. The cancer the had was the easiest to treat so nothing went wrong, but after a while, she discovered she was pregnant. When looked at by doctors, they had all assumed there was something seriously wrong with the child, but it was discovered long after that it was a mistake, and the child was born perfectly normal and healthy.

The thing I took away from this is that there are many mishaps and unfortunate events that can occur through one’s life, and instead of looking at it like a big wall that you can never get past, look at it as something that would stop you only for a short time, and soon you would be able to continue on whatever path you’re on.

The speaker started off studying to be a lawyer, and soon fell in love with wildlife after a trip to Africa. Since then, she has been helping all kinds of endangered wildlife, especially elephants. She also explained how the media uses certain species of endangered animals to gain an audience, which caught my attention.

Out of this talk, I’ve learned to look at the whole picture when looking at only one part of a problem.

 

(Didn’t gather enough information and notes)

This talk was about the struggles of fostering difficult kids in difficult situations. The speaker had taken care of a 6 year old boy, who purposely got into all kinds of trouble, just because he believed he was not good enough to be loved or cared about.  This really hit close to home for me because I’ve experienced feelings like this, but hearing this from an adult’s perspective is very eye-opening and quite depressing, really.

This story was overall my favourite, because it shows how much pain someone can give to another, without realising. It makes everyone think of their actions in a different way, looking a step ahead sort of. Always thinking, ‘is this the right thing to do?’.

One of the stories I heard was about how 61 Nepali kids were given full scholarships in the US but were withdrawn soon after. All had given up their spots in Nepal, where they were studying at the time, to go to America. When they had found out that their scholarships has been withdrawn, they had to fight their way back into other schools that were offering their help. Out of all 61 kids, only 54 had been accepted and granted full scholarships.

This story made me realise that many people are granted things that can be easily taken away from them, and it opened my eyes to how many sacrifices some people make just to go and achieve their dreams. It gave me a new perspective on how others live and have to give things up for opportunities that their family couldn’t achieve.

The Three Gorges Dam has had many downfalls and successes. For example, the dam provides enough energy for 1/3 of the households in China, but it also caused many homes to be destroyed and leaving people homeless. Was the dam worth it?

The advantages and the disadvantages are both very strong points, but only one can be chosen.

 

1.) The air pollution in China

China has had an air pollution problem for years. It is caused by the burning of fossil fuels, such as coal. With the Three Gorges Dam, that can be partially fixed by a lot. The Three Gorges Dam can produce enough Hydroelectric power to be equivalent to 50 million tons of coal, which is a LOT.

2.) The homes and lives lost

Countless villages that were built along the riverside has been in a lot of danger, some even underwater. Many have been flooded, and with the water levels rising and falling drastically, the riverbanks have been weakened. That could cause avalanches and homes being crushed or sliding down hills.

3.) Protection and destruction of the environment

One of the plans for the dam were to make it high enough so that it would be able to protect 25000 hectares of farmland, and sure enough, it did. A large portion of surroundings were still ruined, such as the deforestation happening, and even animal species going extinct. It’s hard to believe, but a species of dolphin, (Yangtze River dolphin) was declared extinct back in 2006.

IN CONCLUSION, I believe that (I guess.. its hard to decide ok) the Three Gorges Dam was a good idea, but the government still needs to figure out how to fix the disadvantages and all the trouble and destruction it has caused. 🙂