Blog 15: Time Machine

Time traveling is not a foreign topic for me. As a matter of fact, it has always been a constant thought of mine. If I was able to travel back to the past, choosing a particular time or era is something that would be pretty hard for me to do. There are many eras in the past that I would love to visit such as the ancient era of the Roman Empire, the Greek Empire, the Chinese Empire and ancient Egypt. I would definitely want to be able to live in the times of when Alexander the Great, Achilles, Hector of Troy, Augustus, Caesar, just to name a few, roamed the earth. And since I am Catholic, I want to be able to see how Jesus Christ lived and how he was crucified by Pontius Pilate. I want to witness the era where the Three Kingdoms ruled China. I would want to go back to the ancient times because that particular era, in my opinion, is just so interesting and it is just full of culture. Not only that, Hollywood generated movies about these empires and about the ancient world like Troy, Alexander, Gladiator, etc; made my interest in the ancient world grow even further. The things I would probably end up doing at those specific era is that I would explore and experience how life was during the ancient times. Experiencing how life is without all the advanced technology that I have surrounded me, without all the usual technology that I use every single day. I want to meet people from the past, interacting with them as if I was a part of that timeline. I also want to witness famous/infamous events like the Trojan War, the Persian War, etc. I also want to be able to watch gladiators fighting, even how horrid it may seem, in the humongous and famous Coliseum during the domination of the Roman Empire. Perhaps you could say that the movie Gladiator made me want to watch gladiator fights.

Traveling back to ancient times would be really cool, but it’s not the only era that I wish to visit if I was given a time machine or the power to travel back in time. I would not mind stopping by the 60’s, 70’s, and the 80’s. To me, these decades seemed so full of life and color. They’re just a happy-go-lucky generation in my opinion compared to the generation I live in now, where everything is just so fast-paced. And coming from my parent’s stories about those times especially in the 80’s, I would definitely love to take a visit. I am also in love with the fashion from those times even thought some are a bit questionable. But, hey, everything changes with time and so does our fashion sense. I probably would do everything that any teenager would do during those times especially since they don’t have anything to fill their boredom or they don’t revolve themselves around the Internet, any social networking sites, or a cellphone. Everything just seemed so laid-back and I’m pretty jealous of that.

Blog 17: Walking Down Memory Lane

Whenever I think about the past, various pictures of my memories cross my mind. From the most distant memories that I could possibly remember when I was still a young girl until to the most recent ones, I could probably and proudly say that I can still vividly recall most of them as if they are movies on a constant playback running on my mind. I would not really say that I have had the best memories nor can I say that I only have happy ones either; because in all reality, we all know that that is a far cry from reality; pretty impossible to happen. Everyone has at least one memory that they consider rather too sorrowful for them to even want to remember and sometimes we choose these memories to be buried in which they are almost extinct from our minds, yet never gone. And then there are also those memories that we cherish so dearly maybe because they were joyful ones, as well as because they served a purpose in our lives that had impacted us in very possible way. Memories are in fact, events in our life.

Like I have mentioned before, I have a very vivid memory and perhaps my one of the memories I can remember very clearly, and it probably will not leave my mind, would be when I broke my arm. It was, I think, the year 2000 or 2001 and I was still living in the Philippines. I was about five or six years-old at that time, I just finished watching a Jackie Chan movie, and as a kid I was a huge Jackie Chan fan. When girls my age would usually watch movies about fairy-tales, princesses, and such; I would usually watch action movies especially Jackie Chan's. Don't get me wrong I did watch all those Disney classics especially Mulan--oh how she was my favorite Disney princess, or rather Disney heroine. I think that kind of gives off some details about my personality, right? But back to as I was saying, I just finished watching a Jackie Chan movie with my brother and cousins, and I was so amazed with his martial arts stunts that I would usually try to imitate him. So when a part of the movie came when he would do a flying kick while high up in the air, I wanted to do the same. Therefore, my brother and I, as well as my cousins went outside of our house and started doing some martial arts that we saw in the movie. I was so into trying to imitate Jackie Chan's stunts especially his flying kick that I tried to do the same stunt. Oh how stupid of me, but hey what can I do, I didn't know better and I was just a kid! So what I did was place a chair in front of me that served as my kicking target while I climbed up into a higher ground, well, a higher chair to say the least. Standing from the higher chair, I balanced myself as I focused my attention on my target. I jumped, so high in the air, while I was on my kicking position. Then, the rest was history. My foot collided with the chair I had intended to hit from the first place, landing abruptly on my right arm on the cemented floor.

Everything went blank; I felt certain numbness before feeling a surge of unexplainable pain on my right arm.  The pain was unbearable and to make it worse my arm looked horrifying. With my arm bent as there was also a cut, I didn't know what was going on nor did I know what had just happened with my arm. As a six year-old I was terrified out of my wits. I started crying I uncontrollably as fear overcame me. My two aunts came outside to where I was, sobbing my little heart out, since my mom was still at work. Examining my arm, they tried to ask me what had happened, but nothing came out of my mouth nor did anything cross my mind until they asked me again and again. I lied, I actually lied about how I ended up on the ground and injuring my arm just so that I could avoid a scolding from them and especially to my mom when she finds out due to my stupidity and recklessness. What I told them was that I was sitting on the high chair and trying to reach something and fell, landing hard on my right arm.

As time passed by, that lie I had made up was still my excuse whenever that topic would come up within my family members, with the exception of my little brother of course. He was the one who actually witnessed the whole incident and the only one who knew what had really happened. He eventually ratted me out and I just blushed in embarrassment as I admitted to it. Nevertheless, it was a memory worth reminiscing.

Blog 9: Family Member Elected to Office

If I were given a chance to be able to elect someone from my family to serve for the government, I would pick my uncle. The position that I would choose to elect him in would be the position of at least a governor. Why? Well it is basically because he is a lawyer. Perhaps, that’s the biggest, yet not the only reason as to why I have chosen him, out of all my family members, to be elected into office. In addition, the reason as to why I chose my Uncle Mike was because he is very much familiar with politics and how it functions. Despite the fact that he is currently residing in the Philippines, he is still very much familiar with the American government and how it works, as well as the issues that they are faced with.

As a matter of fact, I can envision him being elected as the governor of New Jersey. I could just see my Uncle Mike bringing the economy of New Jersey in an upwards direction. With the fact that Governor Chris Christie is targeting the public schools by cutting the school’s budgets down, and cutting school teachers and their salaries, I think that’s an issue that my Uncle would be able to resolve since he values education very much. Moreover, my Uncle Mike also went to a business school before he went to pursue law school. Thus, he also has the mind and knowledge of a business man. He knows the little tweaks here and there about the business world. He would be also be able to offer benefits for everyone of us such as building new businesses that would only make the economy of the state of New Jersey a lot stronger than it is now.

To add to that, Uncle Mike has a good mindset, has good virtues, and principles that would not make him a corrupt politician. Corruption and my uncle does not mix well as he personally hates it. But when anyone takes the time to look at it, who finds corruption appealing anyways? He is not easily swayed by the temptation of having a lot of money, gaining more power, or anything that benefits him through the act of a corrupt politician. It is not in his nature at all. He would rather see his countrymen gain benefits before him, he loves to serve the people. Perhaps that is the reason as to why he is a lawyer in the first place. And speaking of people, my Uncle Mike is a people’s person. He is very charismatic towards the mass since he loves interacting woth people and love to hear their honest opinions o issues. He believes that by listening to them, you are able to learn many things about them and that you are able to improve not only things that needs improvements, but also be able to improve on yourself and how you will be able to handle matters. With these qualities, I believe that my Uncle Mike is eligible enough to be elected as a governor.

Blog 12: Unlimited Travel - Anywhere and Everywhere

If someone was to give me a plane ticket for anywhere in the world and unlimited money for a good three months, I would most likely spend it on many things such as buying numerous souvenirs, traveling to different destinations in different countries. and eating loads of food that I have never tried before. Though at the same time, I would spend the money wisely.

I envision myself traveling around the world instead of staying in the same country, but I have always wanted to visit the countries in Europe and Asia the most. European and Asian cultures just fascinate me so much. It’s not that other cultures other than the two don’t fascinate me, but I have always been more interested at Europe and Asia as well as the culture behind it.  If I was in Europe, I would love to visit Spain, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, Greece, Switzerland, and Portugal; just to name a few. Europe itself is just very mind-boggling in my opinion just because of the rich history that surrounds the continent. I always enjoyed watching and learning about ancient times like the Greeks and Romans. I would love to be able to see all the famous landmarks like the Leaning Tower of Pisa or the Colosseum in Italy, the Eiffel Tower of France, visit the Buckingham Palace or the Stonehenge found in United Kingdom, visiting the sites of where the Greek empires once stood such as the site of the Battle of Thermopylae where 300 Spartans defended and died, and the infamous concentration camps in Germany. There’s just so many places that I would love to visit in Europe

My reasons for wanting to travel around Asia also shares the same reasons with my reasons for wanting to travel around Europe. I am very much fascinated with Asian culture because of the rich culture and all the traditions. Perhaps, it is also because I’m Asian myself or my “Asianess” kicking in, in which I find a certain connection whenever I’m talking or learning about anything Asian-related. The countries I would love to step foot on beside my home country, the Philippines, are South Korea, Japan, China, Taiwan, Thailand, Malaysia, just to name a few once more. Once again, I would definitely visit famous landmarks such as the Great Wall of China, check out the fast life and vibrant lights of Tokyo in Japan, travel in a boat in Bangkok through the waters of Thailand, etc.

In terms of a place to stay, I would probably stay in a luxurious hotel, just to see how it feels like to stay at a fancy hotel. However, I wouldn’t pour all the money into a fancy hotel. I am more concerned about spending my money on traveling to other places. Moreover, when it comes to food and trying new foods, I will most definitely willing to try new foods. I love exotic food so much, well not too exotic to be exact like cow eyeballs or something way out of this world. But most of the time I will try new food, it all depends whether my stomach can hold what I am eating and if it doesn’t gross me out, which is very rare to happen to me anyways. And to add to that, I am not a picky eater to start with. Also, who doesn’t love Asian food?! Thus, trying new food wouldn’t be a problem for me at all.

Blog 16: Keeping Nature Balanced

What does "Keeping nature balanced" exactly mean? In my opinion, the balance of nature is a relationship between organisms --- plants, animals, humans, and other living organisms to be able to co-exist with one another. That is just the natural community our planet provides. These are kept in balanced by all the interactions made by the organisms in specific areas and also their interactions with the non-living factors that surround them. There are many factors that keeps and affects the balance of nature such as population growth of one species. Predators are present for a reason; if a certain specie or, rather prey, happens to grow rapidly without the presence of predators, the flow of the food chain would be affected. In addition, another factor would be keeping stress out between organisms. Animal tend to be very aggressive and fight with each other due to environments being overly crowded. So it is quite important that the flow of the food chain and the population of species not be disturbed in order to keep nature in balance. Other factors that might affect the balance of nature are changes that are deemed to be unnatural especially when humans interrupts the flow of nature.

I would say that the natural world is strutting the borderline in terms of being balanced. If you were to compare the world centuries ago and now, there has been obvious changes that has occurred and the natural world has become less and less balanced. Many living organisms have now become extinct and are on the brink of extinction. The natural environment as well as habitats are being destroyed every single day by the ongoing advancements we, humans, make. We are obliterating forests, in which are home to thousands of species, for industrialization and emerging developments. Moreover, global warming is another factor that interrupts the balance of nature and one of the causes to global warming is pollution that are caused by humans. It will only be a matter of time before all these nature that we take for granted will be gone. Doomsday may very well be near if such disruptions are made in the balance of nature.

However, humans are not always at fault when it comes to nature's balance. As a matter of fact, we are part of that balance. What are we anyway? Are we not part of the world? Are we not also living organisms? We are indeed part of nature's balance and just as much as we tend to take something out of nature's balance, we also give something back. We are at the top of the food chain, therefore we are responsible to keeping order in nature. We are the ones who track and repair what is off balanced in nature. That, in my opinion, is our purpose in nature. That is what we contribute to nature's balance. Although, we are not always in control. There will be factors in nature that we will not be able to control and thus, we will just have to learn to accept it and adapt to it. Sometime, it is better to just leave it to mother nature.