"Slum Dog Millionaire"

This whole weekend I have been singing along to the song “Jai Ho.” This song is really catchy and upbeat, and I was finally able to see the movie “Slum Dog Millionaire” which features the song “Jai Ho.”
I would like to start off by saying that the storyline behind “Slum Dog Millionaire” is probably one of the cleverest ideas I have ever seen portrayed in a movie. In case you haven’t seen or heard about “Slum Dog Millionaire,” it is about a young man that is just a question away from winning India’s version of “Who Wants to be a Millionaire,” when he is accused of cheating. These accusations against him force the main character to explain how he knew the answers to all the previously asked questions.
As the main character (forgot his name!) shares some of the more influential moments of his life, I saw just how hard life is for those living in third world nations.
I’ve heard the statistics about how many people live in poverty in this country, and how many people go with out food in that country, but to see it portrayed like that in a movie was so much more powerful. I can’t imagine living in any of the conditions portrayed on the movie, and I bet life in third world countries is even worse than what was portrayed on the movie.
While it was a really depressing movie at parts, it was still a really good movie overall. It served as a good reminder of how blessed I am to have all the things I do, and really made me think more about the things I usually take for granted.

Here is a video of a local show choir performing “Jai Ho”



***Video from the following URL:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGGGbG-5DTQ

Tennis...

This week was the first week we had practice for the 2010 girls tennis team, and let me just say that it got off to a bumpy start.
Ever since the end of last season I’ve been playing tennis an average of three times a week. With all that time I committed to getting better at tennis, you would think that I would have improved a lot since last year, and my coach assures me that I have, but this week of practice made me feel like every hour I have practiced since last year was a waste of time.
I’m not sure if its been the transition from playing indoor tennis all year to suddenly playing outside, contending with all of the elements, but it’s just been a really difficult and frustrating week. I got so frustrated with myself that I contemplated quitting tennis, and not playing during the season at all. Now, the idea of quitting tennis is in the back of my mind, but I know I would probably never follow through with something like that. Quitting tennis would mean that I have wasted a good portion of the past nine years of my life.
While my coach assures me that things will get better, this week really made me reconsider whether or not I wanted to pursue with tennis in college. So now, I really don’t know what to do in regards to college searching.


***picture taken from the following address: http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a8/lulugirl896/question-mark-737667.jpg

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

The Boy in the Striped Pajamas is a movie about the friendship shared between two eight year old boys. One boy, is the son of a prominent figure in the German army, while the other boy lives a life full of hardships behind the confinement of a barbed wire fence of a Nazi concentration camp.
The German boy, Bruno, is brought up in a good home, and has led a privileged life. After his father is promoted, Bruno and his family are forced to move to the German country side, where his dad will be closer to the concentration camp. While Bruno is not thrilled about having to leave his friends behind, he is excited when he sees some “farmers” outside of is bedroom window. Bruno did not realize until later that these “farmers” were actually people confined within the local concentration camp.
Every now and again, Bruno would notice the columns of smoke leaving the chimneys of the concentration camp, and without knowledge of what it was, would complain about the stench.
In the movie, Bruno’s mother as well as Bruno and his sister, have no idea what is going on inside the concentration camps. I have heard that many Germans didn’t realize what was going on inside the camps until after the war was over, but to actually see that portrayed in a movie was kind of weird for me. It was hard to believe that people could be so clueless as to what was going on right in front of them.
While exploring land beyond Bruno’s house, he comes across a boy in “striped pajamas.” After Bruno makes several trips to and from the barbed wire fence that has become the meeting place of the Jewish boy and Bruno, they form a unique friendship.
One day, Bruno’s friend expresses his distress over the fact that his father went to work somewhere in the camp, but never came back. Bruno volunteers to help the Jewish boy find his father, and so sneeks into the concentration camp. While inside the camp, the boys, as well as many others, are herded into a gas chamber, and killed.
I have seen holocaust movies before, but Im not sure that I’ve ever seen one from the perspective of the Nazi side of the war. I thought the idea behind this movie was really good, and gave good insight into what life was like for a German soldier’s family during the war.



*The previously used picture was taken from the following web adress:
http://blog.newsok.com/bamsblog/files/2009/03/boy-in-striped-pajamas-dvd.jpg

Summer Festivities

As I think about the upcoming tennis season, and this summer I cant help but feel somewhat overwhelmed with everything I’m going to need to deal with, and everything I need to address before school starts up again in the fall. These next few months are going to be very stressful.
Tennis season always makes me stressed out and nervous. I am almost always a competitive person, but sometimes things are just too high strung when it comes to pre-season tennis tournaments, meets, and the annual state tennis tournament. I have been to the state tournament the past two years, once as a spectator, once as a competitor, and something about being surrounded by top notch tennis players like that, always inspires me to play more tennis over the summer, so that I can have a better chance for success the next year.
While I always want to play more tennis over the summer, I always worry that I won’t have enough time to play all the tennis I need to be playing.
I just got a job last spring as a worker for a local ice cream shop. It’s a great part-time high school/summer job, and my boss is great at scheduling around the conflicts that I have. But while all this is true, I always stress about whether or not I’ll be able to play all the tennis I want to, and to do everything else I need to take care of over the summer.
This summer I also have the opportunity to participate in a ninety hour internship. The list of various internships contains hundreds of job opportunities, and the one that most interested me was the physical trainer internship. However, ninety hours seems like a lot of time to give up considering I wouldn’t get paid, and I’m not even sure if I would enjoy something like this. So whether or not I’ll participate in this internship is still to be determined.
My last concern (for now…) is looking at colleges this summer. I don’t want to procrastinate my first college visit for next school year. I want to have a good idea of where I want to go to college at the beginning of my senior year of high school. In order to have an idea of where I want to go though, I need to start looking no later this summer.
With everything that’s been on my mind lately, I think it’s pretty understandable that these next few months could be very stressful.


**The sailboat picture from above can be found at the following adress:http://www.nurseryeducationonline.com/images/summer-holiday-curric.jpg


***Just a note, the picture from my previous post was found at:
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.freeprintablecoloringpages.net/samples/Circus_And_Carnival/Tightrope_Walker.png&imgrefurl=http://www.freeprintablecoloringpages.net/showcover/Circus_And_Carnival/Tightrope_Walker/&usg=__-LQ-ajkwIHk6hrHguv4rGhsG1_M=&h=300&w=300&sz=10&hl=en&start=9&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=jeiZbsiapZ14gM:&tbnh=116&tbnw=116&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dtightrope%2Bwalker%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:*%26rlz%3D1I7GGLG_en%26tbs%3Disch:1

Balancing Act

This weekend was probably the first time I sat down and researched several colleges at one time. My tennis coach finally got me the list of colleges he thinks I should look at, and so I stayed up looking into the universities he recommended for me.
The list he made out included about six colleges varying from several division three colleges to one division one college.
The list included:
-Coe College
-Carleton College
-DePauw University
-Central College
-UW-Whitewater
-Huntington College
-University of South Dakota

I haven’t finished looking at all of the colleges from his list yet, but I have ruled out a couple of them. I don’t want to go to Coe College, (it’s just too close to where I live now) or to Central College (the town is too small, and there aren’t any actual indoor tennis courts). But while I have decided that at least two of these colleges are probably not for me, none of the colleges I have looked at so far have really convinced me that I want to go there. In fact, researching these different schools has made me rethink whether or not I actually want to play tennis in college.
I know that in the past I have probably sounded like a broken record with all the times I have said that I want to play tennis in college, but researching all of these colleges has made me reconsider whether or not college tennis is for me.
Believe it or not I actually hate tennis. Well not really, but sometimes I really feel like I do. Tennis tournaments and meets can be really stressful, and there are so many rivalries, that it can all just be too much to deal with at times. If everyone I ever had to play was always nice and pleasant (whether they were winning or losing) than I probably would decide to play college tennis. But when I get stuck playing someone with a really nasty attitude, it just takes all the fun out of playing the game. And when I think about the attitudes of my opponents, it seems like I shouldn’t let that determine whether I play tennis or not, but for me, its actually a lot bigger of a deal than it probably sounds.
As I think of the approaching high school tennis season, I can’t help but feel a sense of dread. I love playing tennis, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t always like the competitive aspect of the game.
So whether or not I am going to play college tennis is still up in the air, which presents a problem for me in doing my research. Since I don’t know if I should play tennis in college or not, it makes choosing colleges to look at a little more tricky. At this point, what I plan on doing is looking at colleges that fit the other criteria I want to see in my future alma mater, and not rule out any school based on whether or not they have a tennis program.

I forgot to credit the last picture I added to my blog! The picture can be seen elsewhere by clicking the following link.
http://www.bonitanaplesrealestate.com/images/communities/generic/Tennis%20ball%20&%20Racquet.jpg

Tennis in College

This weekend was probably the first time I sat down and researched several colleges at one time. My tennis coach finally got me the list of colleges he thinks I should look at, and so I stayed up looking into the universities he recommended for me.
The list he made out included about six colleges varying from several division three colleges to one division one college.
The list included:
-Coe College
-Carleton College
-DePauw University
-Central College
-UW-Whitewater
-Huntington College
-University of South Dakota


I haven’t finished looking at all of the colleges from his list yet, but I have ruled out a couple of them. I don’t want to go to Coe College, (it’s just too close to where I live now) or to Central College (the town is too small, and there aren’t any actual indoor tennis courts). But while I have decided that at least two of these colleges are probably not for me, none of the colleges I have looked at so far have really convinced me that I want to go there. In fact, researching these different schools has made me rethink whether or not I actually want to play tennis in college.
I know that in the past I have probably sounded like a broken record with all the times I have said that I want to play tennis in college, but researching all of these colleges has made me reconsider whether or not college tennis is for me.
Believe it or not I actually hate tennis. Well not really, but sometimes I really feel like I do. Tennis tournaments and meets can be really stressful, and there are so many rivalries, that it can all just be too much to deal with at times. If everyone I ever had to play was always nice and pleasant (whether they were winning or losing) than I probably would decide to play college tennis. But when I get stuck playing someone with a really nasty attitude, it just takes all the fun out of playing the game. And when I think about the attitudes of my opponents, it seems like I shouldn’t let that determine whether I play tennis or not, but for me, its actually a lot bigger of a deal than it probably sounds.
As I think of the approaching high school tennis season, I can’t help but feel a sense of dread. I love playing tennis, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t always like the competitive aspect of the game.
So whether or not I am going to play college tennis is still up in the air, which presents a problem for me in doing my research. Since I don’t know if I should play tennis in college or not, it makes choosing colleges to look at a little more tricky. At this point, what I plan on doing is looking at colleges that fit the other criteria I want to see in my future alma mater, and not rule out any school based on whether or not they have a tennis program.