Village by the sea

This book talks about the struggle of two young kids, Hari and Lila as they take the responsibility of taking care of the family. They have to take care of their younger siblings, Bela and Kamal, as well as their sickly mother and drunken father. This book is set in a small fishing village named Thul and the author focuses on the themes, poverty and wealth, urban and rural India, family, benefactors and change and adaptation.

The Dysfunctional Family

This book depicts a dysfunctional family in the relations of Hari’s and Lila’s family. In a normal family, the father is the head of the house and takes charge of taking care of the family. However, in Lila and Hari’s case, their father refuses to work and leaves all this responsibility to family, choosing to go out every night and drink toddy. This can be seen from “their father and the three brothers from the neighbouring farm who drank together every night” pg 32. He also gets the family into debt. “He had sold his boat to pay his debts.” Their mother was also “to ill and weak to get out of her bed” pg 3 and is unable to take care of her children and control her husband’s drinking habit. Because of this, Lila takes charge of her mother’s role, looking after the house and handling all the household chores like cooking, cleaning, washing and buying of groceries. She made a decision to quit school to take care of her mother and stay home to do the chores.

· Hari

Hari, just like Lila, has to grow up quickly in order to support his family. He is very important to his sisters as someone who takes care of them and earns money for the family. He is the head of the house and takes the responsibility of his father. During the monsoon season, the three sisters who were in their hut were praying for Hari’s return as they warmed themselves by the fire. Hari is very mature and is very eager to earn more money for his family. This can be seen from “He must have a job if he was to find his sisters a way out this dark gloomy house and the illness and drunkenness and hopelessness that surrounded them like the shadows of the night.” Pg 68. Hari has to adapt quickly in the story as he faces an environment totally foreign to him in Bombay. At first, he felt lost and unsure of what he should do in the city, but with the help of Jagu and Mr Panwallah, he managed to overcome this and even get a job in the Sri Krishna Eating House owned by Jagu. He is also helped by Mr Panwallah, the watch mender who thought him the skill of watch mending which benefitted him at the end of the story. Mr Panwallah also treated Hari like his son and made Hari feel like a kid again which he had always wanted to be. “It made it him feel like one of them, a child again- not a small, shrivelled adult keeping up with other adults in a hard world.” Hari, despite all his responsibilities, wants to be a child and be carefree like the other children and not having to handle so many problems. He has to make decisions in life like whether to work on Biju’s boat go to Bombay or wait for the factories to be built in the village. He is in a dilemma and has to make this very important in life as such a young age which may affect his future.

However, after facing so many problems in his life, Hari finally matures and learnt from Mr Panwallah that change is inevitable and the only way to counter it is to keep learning. “ Learn, learn, learn- so that you can grow and change.”

A book that influenced my mother

A book that influenced my mother was “Memoirs of A Geisha” by Arthur Golden. The story is a novel about a geisha named Sayuri. Sayuri's story begins in a poor fishing village in 1929, when, as a nine-year-old, she is taken from her home and sold into slavery to a renowned geisha house. We witness her transformation as she learns the rigorous arts of the geisha: dance and music; wearing kimono, elaborate makeup and hair; pouring sake to reveal just a touch of inner wrist; competing with a jealous rival for men's solicitude and the money that goes with it. But as World War II erupts and the geisha houses are forced to close, Sayuri, with little money and even less food, must reinvent herself all over again to find a rare kind of freedom on her own terms.

My mother’s feelings about the book

Compare to the geisha my children are much luckier, not needing to worry bout a single thing I life, even though they have to study very hard. They have no worries in life, other than school and homework which can be encountered with hard work, whereas the life of a geisha is uncertain and they do not know what their future holds. I hope my children have the courage and strength to fight for a better future. They should be fortunate to live such peaceful and happy lives. Just like my mothers always say, “Take a look at others around you and you would know how lucky you really are”. I hope my kids will also understand this.

This has been a meaningful interview with my mother and I personally feel very lucky that I do not need to live the life of a geisha. I must work hard for a better future and be thankful that have such a good life.

HOTA

HOTA

Donation of organs, well I guess people are not willing to a donor. “Why get into so much trouble, I won’t receive any money? Well, it’s because of this of mind set which is the reason why so many countries including Singapore face a shortage of organ donors. People nowadays are just too selfish to care for others and not kind-hearted enough. Why must I care? They always say. As a result, illegal organ trading has aroused in our community. I will be sharing my views on this issue.

I will be looking at this issue from a different point of view compared to many people. People always think that organ trading is unsafe and harmful. Well, I think of it otherwise, I think of it from an economist’s point of view, believing that the best solution for this problem is to legalise organ trading. I bet you all are already beginning to object. I see the potential moral hazards in this solution as negligible compared to the potential of saving so many more lives, when people can get organs more efficiently.

To begin my debate, I would first explain the moral hazards that would occur in this solution. Now, a moral hazard occurs when an individual hides information from another individual whom he is doing the transaction with. So in relationship to the solution, the moral hazard would occur as the recipient doesn’t know whether the organ he/she is buying is from a credible source etc. But, think of it this way, it saves lives anyway, so it is a benefit! This shows that benefit outweighs the cost.

It is better to make organ trading legal than illegal because people will turn to black markets and undergo illegal operations which are a lot more dangerous. Further more, legalising trade will allow regulatory practices to be set up to monitor the trade, which means that it will be set at certain prices that are deemed reasonable. Regulation, the lower income people will also benefit as the government will find it trustworthy enough, thus finding ways to help the lower income group!

This are my views, however there are many different views to this never ending debate, so comment and tell me your views!

Graphic and written novels

Graphic novels and written novels

Graphic novels and written novels, so similarities and differences do they have? Let me share with you my views.

So what differences do they have? Firstly, we look at the way they express emotions and feelings. In graphic novels, the author uses pictures and visual arts to give the reader clearly understand how the characters are feeling. Whereas for written novels, the author makes use of the power of words to express an emotion. When we read graphic novels, we can actually feel as if we know the characters and how they are feeling as we have experiences of people in our daily lives having the same type of feeling and moods of these characters, therefore recognising their different facial expressions and reactions. In contrast, when we read written novels, it is sometimes more complex and gives more space for thinking.

Secondly, they are also different in the way they express speech. Normally in written novels, speech is directly quoted, however in graphic novels, as only descriptions are used, movements are used to show speech and therefore everyone has a different interpretation of what they are saying. For example, in written novels, we may see a character who is angry at another person saying “Hey you! Why must you do that?” However in graphic novels, you may see the character glaring at the latter with a fierce expression, pointing his finger at him/her with his mouth open.

Now let’s look at the similarities. Firstly, both graphic and written novels show a change in perspective. In graphic novels, the author may first show a close up of an object and slowly moves back so that the reader has a wider perspective of what is going on.(e.g. The Arrival by Sshawn Tan) Same thing when it come to written novels, the author shows the perspective of the different characters in the story so that the reader has a better idea of the situation and understand the different views of the many characters. ( e.g. Nothing But The Truth by AVI)

Secondly, both graphic and written novels also have strong literature in it. Let’s look at The Arrival for example. In the beginning of the story, there is a long dragon like creature which in roaming around the city as the protagonist is accompanied by his family to the train station. Is this the reason why the protagonist is leaving, or is it the author’s a way of expressing irony or maybe even trouble which is present in the protagonist’s home town? There are so many different ways to interpret this, which gives the readers something to ponder about as they read on. Now let’s look at a graphic novel, My Story by Dave Pelzer. In this novel, the author describes his mother as a “monster” who always abuses him and vents his anger on him. Yet, nearing the middle of the story, when he moves away to live with Alice, his benefactor, the protagonists begins to miss him mother, on the other hand afraid that she would take him back home. The author expresses a strong sense of love, hate and fear, which leads to the question, what true feelings does the protagonist of his mother?

In conclusion, both graphic novels and written novels are enjoyable to read as they have their own uniqueness. So why not read add graphic novels to your list of books, I’m sure you’ll truly enjoy it!