Delaney's Blog

     Word Count: 263 words Another coming of age story but this time about a Pakistan woman, troubled trying to determine who she is as a woman when she takes up many different roles in her life. She has an identity crisis as she lives in a third world country but says there are no women in third world countries. Meatless Days , the title of this story, refers to the time around 1947 where the government decided that two days out of each week would be "meatless days" where no meat was consumed to preserve the amount of cattle and goats in Pakistan. I read this and think that this is a great idea to preserve the cattle and goats, not allowing them to go extinct in Pakistan. Suleri realizes things that Pakistan is missing, for example, history, culture geography, etc. She realizes there is a lot more to the world that she is not exposed to.  A quote I found interesting is, "A face, puzzzled and attentive and belonging to my gender, raises its intelligence to question w...

 Word Count: 264 words      This story from the beginning is different from our other stories because Onnie Lee Logan decides that her job will be a midwife as she is passionate about helping woman in their most vulnerable, difficult, and important moment of their lives. Her life of being a midwife is around 1984, she was a black woman who knew she could step up to share her knowledge with woman who need her help.      Her mother and grandmother, also midwives, inspired her career's work and passion. She was able to help poor, black mothers receive access to great care, as they deserve the same treatment, knowledge, and help as the rest of America. Onnie was eventually stripped of her midwife license, which is extremely harsh considering this was her entire life, but was told she was no longer needed.      "Nothing in my life has ever made me feel so little," Onnie says when recounting the letter she received in the mail telling her her ...

 Word Count: 258 words From a young age, Nisa was punished when wanting to nurse from her mother while her mother was pregnant. When her brother was born, her mother immediately wanted to bury her brother to be able to nourish her.  Being married at 8 years old, being carried to the hut to be married, incase she were to run away. It blew me away learning this age being married, but still not being able to value marriage and your partner, wanting to just be a kid! A quote that stuck out to me was, "Because woman possess something very important, something that enables men to live: their genitals." This quote shows me exactly why marriage and having a child (12 years old) happens so sped up. Woman are wanted for very specific reasons very early on. Nisa only knows what it is like to be married from those in their society. They only know the way of knowing how things are supposed to be is by looking around you at your community. Not knowing the way the rest of the world's so...

 Word Count: 258 words The memoir begins with these words, "'You must not tell anyone,' my mother said, 'what I am about to tell you. In China your father had a sister who killed herself. She jumped into the family well. We say that your father has all brothers because it as if she had never been born.'" This is an extremely strong way that Kingston begins her memoir, something that begins to show internal struggle that she faces because there are so many different things that make up who she and her family are, together and separately. Knowing this information finally would make me feel betrayed.  Another line that I think is powerful is when Kingston reveals, "And I have so many words- 'chink' words and 'gook' words too- that they do not fit on my skin.'" Being labeled as words you do not agree with is extremely difficult to handle, knowing that clapping back and sticking up for yourself hardly works against the disgusting words...

 Word Count: 265 words In the 1990s, Beryl explains her life in Kenya, as we see a different type of memoir than the ones we have read so far. She is in aviation, becoming a bush pilot.  Helping her to gain perspective in her life, growing up she spends lots of time with the native people. She would hunt with this tribe, stepping up to kill a hog in the process. She first was a horse trainer, stemming from her father giving her a colt to deliver. She was the first African woman to become a horse trainer, this amazing feat becoming a staple to her life of success. She knows she is built to accomplish great things, stemming her love for aviation.  I am inspired by her hope to be the first to fly from London to New York, unfortunately resulting in a crash landing due to her fuel freezing. She is honorable due to her drive to not only be the first woman, but the first woman to accomplish this difficult task, not letting fear of failure stop her. I am amazed at her attempt and...

 Word Count: 265 words      This memoir takes place from 1914 to 1931. This takes place on a coffee-plantation in Africa, where Dinesen runs this plantation with her husband until they separate. When they are no longer together, she runs the plantation by herself and lives her life here until she later loses this farm/estate and goes back to Denmark where she is originally from.      Her storytelling is impeccable as she got great at it while telling her stories to African locals who love using their imagination to dive into stories. She tells her stories with great detail and excitement, something we can all learn to add into our writing. She finds her love for the country of Africa and what comes with the land, people, and experiences.       A powerful quote from this reading is, " “It is more than their land that you take away from the people, whose Native land you take. It is their past as well, their roots and their identity. I...

 Word Count: 292 words From a young age, Totto-Chan was expelled from her school for having lots of energy and "disrupting the class." You can see here how innocent she is, how closing a desk repeatedly would get her expelled from her first school.  A strong figure in your life is all you need to push forward and continue to want to change your life and those lives around you for the better. Totto-Chan first experienced this with her headmaster at her new school, making her excited to leave her house and learn. Tomoe, the new school she attended within a train car, was a school designed to bring about creativity in the students, in ways the students believe things should be done. Students were able to specialize in learning about what they were interested in, or discovering what they loved. I believe these tactics should be used in schools in America as I believe a lot of time is wasted going through curriculum you are expected to go through.  The 1945 airstrikes took all...

 Word Count: 264 words This story describes two different lives from a mother to her daughter, taking place in the 1950s. The author describes how she was made to feel like a burden her entire life by her mother for being a part of the working class. We see this perspective and it is heartbreaking for a child to feel this way by her own mother. Women are expected to always want children, so this comes off shocking when a mother cannot demonstrate her love for her child. From a young age the author is instilled to know that there is a huge drop off in society to those in the working class. They will never get what the rich have, and these different classes completely separate them. She learns that their is no way to move classes or earn a better life for yourself, which is entirely wrong. This is deemed an ordinary life, but is far from it once stepping into their shoes. Something interesting to take away from this reading is stories we tell ourselves about our own lives. Clearly we...