everything into the garbage! YAY!

One day, I realized how much "garbage" I had collected. Most of them were notes, projects, brochures, essays, and scrap paper that had collected throughout my 16 years of schooling. They were DUSTY and they took up TOO MUCH space. OMG...i swear the amt I threw out can add up to 3 whole garbagebag-fulls.

Once in a while, I'd regret throwing them out. They were the remnants of my school life, kinda, because it cited what I had been learning, my progress, my ideas, my memories....they were things that contributed to my schoolin!! Going through my old works was a rewarding experience that I'll never forget. But i swear I will never go through that load again!! What a pain! once is enough already.

On the other hand, they were merely junks that I had barely touched. I might as well turn those into "recycled products" *neat*

My last blog for span312

well, school is finally over, and now there are finals. Good that my other class, like span 312, dont have finals either. But then, because we had to do time-consuming projects instead of exams, the last 2 wks of school was crazy for me. Anyhow, at least i get to hang out when other ppl are busy studying.

Before I took the course, I thought it is going to be boring,but then i didnt know anything about spanish so I was very curious. It turns out that the old books are not that bad. I like the president and the feast of the goat the most. I thought i'll absolutely hate the supreme, but then I like how it ends, and all that meaning behind it that we discussed in class. I think the philosophy is very interesting, but if only we dont need to read the book...the prof could just explain it all to us instead of reading it cuz i didnt get it after reading it any ways.

Well, these books taught me the history of south america and the significance of power. Power can influence people, creates dictators, influence dictation, influence texts, influence writing, in turn they both changes history.....etc. I also learned about the reality of political corruption and the disguisting nature of humanity in some people, such as the the torturing scenes in the dictator novels.

I really learned a lot from this course, and is very impressed by the prof, of how he could make some boring texts interesting.

and I could see how much time and effort he put into this course. So Thankyou very much.

O but one important question. what wil happen if i forgot to sign the attendance sheet on some days? Cuz i didnt miss a class the whole term other than the last wk of school.

Hope all our wikipedia prj turns out well! HAGS!

the feast of the goat continue

The story is pretty ironic. Trujillo was like the King. His family can do whatever they want. But Trujillo ended up assassinated by some of his closest people. Also, despite such a horrible father he is, his elder son revenges for his death. And little did he know, his family lived very poorly after his death. His wife hid lots of money from the family at the Royal Bank, and still didn’t let the sons know after Trujillo’s death. She died, and her money became the bank’s. The sons are poor, got beaten. I actually feel sorry for the sons. They both lack fatherly love as well as a mother’s. The daughter somehow turned out to be the most fortunate, ministering to people on the streets, but people think that this shouldn’t be something for her to do, and laughs at her.
Something fake about this story is how Urania can kept on talking and talking to her father who couldn’t speak or give much response back? Not only this, what she talks about is ….well…a lot of stuff… more like too much.

the feast of the goat, first half

although a big novel than the general in his labyrinth, it feels easier to read. I like how it began with Urania’s story. It’s unique in that Urania is a female, and the book started in a the modern setting. Even the writing style is more modern compared to the other dictator novels (well, it IS written in the modern day). The dialogue between her and other people brings back a lot of memories of the past. And with proper punctuation marks and stuff….this story is pretty easy to grasp. However, right when I start reading chapter 2, I got a bit confused. It is a different storyline. We went back to the Dominican times…and then Trujillo shows up… I understand why the author uses this structure in his writing. It allows us to think in different perspectives, adding some from each storylines, little by little. But really, it turns out confusing when I didn’t expect the novel to have such a structure. It made me go back and read the beginning over again to make sure what was happening.

Reading it again the second time, I realized that the beginning of chapter one already hints something about rascism: Urania complaining about her name. I later found out that Trujillo, the Dominican dictator himself, also cares a lot about his race: He wants to look whiter. He’s like making a white regime, ruling with a lot of outside influence..

Like other dictators, he is very egocentric. He made his followers offer their wives and children to him for pleasure, and even boasts about it. What made me more stunned was the fact that those husbands allowed this to happen, and some even say that it is an honor. Urania’s dad knew that this sexual violation is wrong (he was very afraid when Trujillo’s eldest son kissed Urania’s hand), yet he is still loyal to the dictator.

Trujillo’s eldest son committed lots of crimes. Trujillo himself, have even said that he regrets about having a family like his, that his sons are not supportive. Well, guess what, he is not a supportive father either.and easy to read. The Feast of the goat is a very interesting novel.

the general continue

as i continue to read "the general...", he continues to be sick with insomnia and dreams a lot. He says in p182 "The only thing lacking is for me to die". He continues to be physically weak, exposed, and seems to die soon, but he still have some strength or power at times that some people think that he might be faking the sickness. Well, he dont like to feel that he need anyone and he enjoys doing some things by himself and keeping a personal distance from even his jose palacios. However, there are parts in the book where the General seems so out of shape and especially lost. For example, in p153, "[Manuela] arrived in Santa Fe de Bogota just in time to save the little life remaining to the General on the evil night of September 25. Six years had gone by since they had met, but he was as aged and full of doubt as if it had been fifty, and Manuela had the impression that he was wandering without direction through the mist of solitude." At other times, he is ambitious to achieve something, to go somewhere. Later on the book, he gets weaker...more pains, suffers a vertigo attack, worn out and skinny,. Wilson says, "disease was the only enemy the General feared, and he refused to confront it so that he would not be distracted from the greatest enterprise of his life." (212)

At parts of the book i can also see how the general is quite a stubborn person, possibly from nationalism, using most of the money left to him, and refusing to auction his scant resources(210).

Lastly, throughout the book, the General still enjoys looking at beautiful women and women were given descriptive descriptions. Still, no women could make him stay or love. (183) He is not committed to them no matter if he kept them in his memory, sent them passionate letters or gifts...

The general in his labyrinth

This book is way easier to read than "I, the Supreme", phew~! The first day I started reading this book, I almost read half of the book. On the other hand, when I was reading I the Supreme, I could stay on two pages the whole day, and drift off to some other place.

What's distinct with this book is the writing style. It is more simple and the chapters are all focused on what happened to the General (It stays on topic and have less name to recognize). What I found interesting about this dictator is how he loves so many women. Something I dont get is the part where he slept with a slave and thus given her freedom. First of all, why didnt she scream when someeone naked walked to her and start kissing her and why would one of her only words were telling him that she is a slave? And then how she didnt leave with him afterwards could make the general disappointed? But this (and other stories of him) however tells me that the General is very observant of women and also likable by women too. For example, someone's wife would sleep with him.

I also dont get how he can be sick for so long...yet the stories continue.
Anyhow, this book is still easier to follow and somewhat interesting too.

It shows me the power of the General. He can set slaves free. Women comes to ask him for favours. He can make people die whenever he likes. But then, the power of this general is less horrendous than the dictators from the previous dictator books that we've read.

Oh, there's a part that reminded me of the President. Remember that part where he was saved from an assasination because he was busy talking to the beautiful Miranda (was it her? a possible spy?), while his friend was in the general's room and was mistaken as him at that time, and died instead of him? Well, this made clear of how easy it was for the government to accuse the death of the colonel in the beggining of "The President" must be an assasination, and that no one would believe that it was just a tragic accident...that it was actually the Zany who killed him...cause politics were corrupted and assassinations could be prevalent.

continue...I, the Supreme,

After the class discussion, I learned to recognize some of the humoor in the book. Not that the book was not confusing...it still is. However, the stories shows me things that i would never have thought of. it showed me a lot of creative thinking, probably because the thoughts came from someone who was CRAZY. From this book, i learned a lot about the qualities and characteristics that dictators might have. But over all, even the Supreme was just all crazy about power and wanting everything his way. He was too proud of himself, very egocentric, and very critical indeed (although at times showed* his tolerant for Patino). I wonder if its the need of power that made him this way or if he was just born with such an ambitious personality and wanting unreasonable things. He does think things in peculiar ways.

It has other parts that reminds me of Facundo and the President. Talking about war and Paraguaya...etc. reminds me of the importance of geography and history. Along with the facts, documents, historical figures, and compilers notes, etc. kept I, the Supreme in the middle of fiction and non-fiction,,,and always kept me wondering what had happened, what was true and what was made up. On the other hand, I hate names! Names got me so confused for Faaaaacundo. In the Supreme, it refered to many famous people that i felt guilty of not recognizing, while some of these people might have believed to have existed. For example, it talked about Cain from the bible, who sounds familiar. Lastly, it talked about the death of El Supremo, which reminds me of how the book, Facundo, talked about how the dictator (Facundo) died too.

There were parts that reminds me of the President, such as using symbolism and repetitions. In the president, it kept on using words like "devil", "demons", "Lucifer"...In the Supreme, it kept refering to the "skull". I remember there was a part where someone died and the Supreme wouldnt let the relative take back the corpse. That reminded me of the President too.