Today my best friend Lemon died...

July 17th, 1963
Dear diary,
Today my best friend Curt Lemon got blown into a tree by a land mine and died. He was the one guy in the company that always had me back; he was always there for me and vice versa. Later today I came across a baby water buffalo, this creature seemed to be unharmful and was very approachable. I do not know what happened but the next thing I know I was shooting away at this water buffalo. For some reason it felt amazing to get all of my anger out on this animal for the loss of my Best friend. It was disturbing and worrisome to see myself doing this but I could not stop something inside of me. I had this tension building in my stomach and I did not stop shooting until I knew the thing was dead. After I killed the buffalo, I felt as though a weight had been lifted off my shoulders and I could continue with my day then. The thought of losing my best friend is dreadful but killing the baby water buffalo made me feel a little better inside.

I used figurative language to show how that this entry would’ve come from Rat Kiley’s diary; I also used the 1st person to describe the situation from Kiley’s point of view. Specific details were used to show my understanding of the novel and engage myself in the story that I’m telling.

Blog Post 4

Picture found at http://www.milesmodernart.com/.

This modern artwork shows the modern philosophy because it there is no real meaning to it. This expresses the idea that there are absolutes in modernism. Also, the purpose of modern philosophy is to question the meaning and that is exactly what I did when I first saw this artwork. When I look at this I think about so many different things it could represent: love, because of the different shades of red; the use of swirls and circles strongly represent the balance in the painting. Beauty is represented in this from the smoothness of the curves; there are no jagged edges or abrupt stops in the colors.

Picture found at http://www.thatpurplestuff.blogspot.com/ .

This piece of artwork is a perfect example of post-modernism. When I look at this I don’t really know what to think about or look at first, my eyes are just wandering. I really feel the uncertainty, by not knowing what’s going on. That is exactly what postmodernism is defined as; confusion, uncertainty, and ambiguity. The abstract colors confuse my mind a lot, along with the random colored teeth that are not actually there. My mind goes directly to thinking about what the letters represent in the ears, a B and an O. They could be abbreviations or anything else. That is the beauty of postmodernism, there is no specific answer to your questions.

In the novel “The Things They Carried,” postmodernism is shown a lot. On page 180, “What stories can do, I guess, is make things present…. I can make myself feel again. ‘Daddy, tell the truth,’ Kathleen can say, ‘did you ever kill anybody?’ And I can say, honestly, ‘Of course not.’ Or I can say, honestly, ‘Yes.’” Here, O’Brian is really confusing the happening truth with the story truth. It shows the uncertainty in his mind; he does not know exactly what to say to his daughter. Also, he does not know what the real truth is anymore because he has been telling many different stories.

Blog Post 3

I now submit exhibit A, which describes how Jimmy Cross feels about the book O’Brian is going to write, “And do me a favor. Don’t mention anything about---“ “No,” I said, “I won’t.” We see here that Jimmy Cross is talking to Tim O’Brian about the book O’Brian is going to write in the future about the war. Cross can be talking about a number of things that he would like O’Brian not to mention. I think he is referring to either Martha or his best friend Ted Lavender. Both of which are very sore subjects to Cross. In the war Ted Lavender’s died and Cross feels very responsible for it because he(Cross) was always too preoccupied by the thought of Martha that he didn’t keep tight rein on the boys in his troop. So, one day when lavender was goofing around with one of the other guys, he just got shot in the back and fell over like a dead brick. Cross was angry with himself and told himself things needed to change, he began keeping a closer eye on all of his boys.
On the other hand, Jimmy Cross could be saying he doesn’t want O’Brian to mention Martha in his story. It goes along with the same reasoning in that he was ashamed that she was taking over his mind. He didn’t want it to get out because none of his friends knew about it except O’Brian. There are times when Cross would be daydreaming and not even paying attention of thinking about the war. I think that was his biggest problem personally in the whole war. It almost would have been better if Cross didn’t have a Martha in his life.
There may be something more terrible than Lavender or Martha that happened to him in the war and that could be what he is hiding. No one really knows that truth and therefore it is open-ended for your imagination to run wild and explore different options.

Blog Post 2

Part 1
How were the POW’s treated?
Why were the Vietcong so horrible?
Why did the US say it was a must for them to be over fighting?
How did the US view the war?
How did Vietnam view the war?
The typical day for a Vietnam soldier.

Part 2
It was very shocking to hear that the Vietnamese kids knew nothing about the war. Even at the elite high school, the kids were not even being taught the basics of the war. The ones that were told about the war have a very distorted view on it because they are taught only one side of it, the communist government side. They were taught that the French and Americans colonized Vietnam, which clearly is not right. The students were also not told about the Civil War that Vietnam was having. It was a one sided teaching lesson when it came to the schools. The adults believe that the war should not be taught because it happened in the past and no one should dwell on it. The government decides how history is taught all over the country of Vietnam. The Vietnamese philosophy of forgetting is not right. I think it will hurt the generations that don’t learn correctly what happened, and from then on history will be messed up. Based on the video, I don’t think Vietnam is healing at all. In order to heal from something the first step is to recognize the problem. Clearly, no one wants to admit that there was ever a war in the country.

Part 3
Wow I just saw a picture of My Lai on the Internet. I’m not so sure that these pictures are real? I have never heard of any such war in Vietnam. I’m confused.
Is this picture for real? What really happened during the Vietnam War? I saw a picture of someone burning himself, and wanted to cry. I didn’t know our schools or whoever would hide such a tragic thing from us. How many people died? What was the cause of this? I can’t believe it I’m in utter shock.

Blog Post #1

http://www.geocities.com/tcartz/images/monkonfire.jpg

This is a picture of a Monk-Buddhist during the Monk-Buddhist war protest. He is burning himself alive in act of the protest. This picture conveys the desperation of the Monk-Buddhists and there view of the war. Also, it shows how badly they wanted the war to be over. The Vietnam soldiers were very shocked at the view of someone burning alive because it is such a drastic measure. As an American citizen, I am very stunned by this picture. My first thought was “why would someone do this to themselves?” I’m sure other American’s at the time thought the exact same thing when they saw such a picture. Also the Cambodian’s, Laos, and Vietnam citizens felt the same way. This changes my perception of the war because I never know people would actually go this far to try and stop the war. I didn’t know people felt so strongly and hated the thought of war so much. When I first saw this picture, my heart sank at the thought of someone actually doing this. Made me very sad.