SERVICE LEARNING...Monday, April 21, 2008

1. Reflect on Thursday's meeting via your blog. Group leaders should also email me with questions, ideas, and notes. Required: three positives about the meeting, and three challenges you face.

I think that our meeting on Monday was one of the best we'll ever have. We gained so much in what we would do. We found how we would make money and we also found what the children in CHOP would need! Yet I do have one question about our mission & our roles in the group! I am not sure what actually our role is, is it JUST TO FOLLOW MRS. MADHI'S RULES??? Well I do not think that we should just have to do this. I think that we should all have just as much a say in what happens in our group as Mrs. Madhi does! Though she is a teacher it still does not mean that she has to dictate our group!

A role that I would like to have in the group is the reporter, I like the idea! I could also take on the role of a Photographer/Videographer.

SERVICE LEARNING...Monday, March 3, 2008

Monday, March 3, 2008
Service Learning- March 3-7

I have been trying to find things to do for my independent service learning hours for a long time. On the other hand for a long time people have been telling me that I am way too young to volunteer everywhere that I go... even the Philadelphia public library! For the school wide project, I suggested that we help the homeless, but I can tell that from the responses that I heard from the teacher, & students that this will not happen!

What interest me, is the fact that I could hold the power to help as many as one to over one-hundred people during this project. I would like to help families in shelters, this way I could help as many people as possible. Contacts, I already have. I have a personal contact to the Salvation Army Family Residence Shelter, this way I could talk to people about what they need and how they can be helped! I have lots of research and I know that I can make this happen with the proper support from my school!

READ THIS -- MR. ROMERO!!!!!!! TO BE FINISHED!!!!

MR ROMERO I AM NOT YET FINISHED BUT COULD YOU GO THROUGH THIS IN CLASS???????


Whoever said being a whore was easy, lied, but somebody has to do it! (Tanika Lynch, 2006, jacket summary, Whore) Falling through the black hole of society, and growing up in the hard street of Detroit, Kamone, 14, had to feed three mouths including herself by prostituting around the streets. Since she was left on her own at a young age, and coming from a family of tricks, and pimps, she turned to the only job she had her seen her "mother" do, she started to prostitute. There are four reasons why I absolutely loved this book. The first because it made me scared, second because it made me feel like I was there. The third because it had an ending that I did not expect, and fourth because it had drama, killing, sex, life, love, "love" and suspense!

Kamone was forced to prostitute all of the time, by her pimp Cookie, because she was Cookies' number one business profit! Kamone was lost in this world, born to and abandoned by her poor, white trash, dope fiend, prostitute, HIV infected mother, there was nothing Kamone would not do to get some cheddar. She had to the burden of taking care of her two siblings both under the age of 5. She took drugs to keep her awake during her tricking(which she had become addicted to), was almost murdered, had sex to make money, was raped by numerous men, and was lied to by many! That was until she is set up to be raped, drugged, and left for dead by a scandalmonger, fagot, prostitute, and his/her crew. This made Kamone aware that no one was her helping hand and that she had to make it on her own, and take care of "her kids" herself! This was some of the drama, sex, life, violence, and a little of the suspense I enjoyed in this book.
Kamone planned to go into Cookies apartment and steal her money(a lot of money) under the floor board, so that she could run away with her sister & brother and make a new life. Like every thing in Kamone's life, the plan went wrong! Cookie found Kamone trying to take the money and almost jumped on her. As an instinct Kamone pushed Cookie, and she fell into the stove fire. Instantly, the fire engulped Cookie and her fat self and she burned to a crisp. As Kamone ran out of the apartment, before she would also have to fight for life too, she quickly took the money and ran past the on-call prostitutes. Cookie was the only source of family & money that these prostitutes had in their lives. So, when they found what Kamone had done, accident or not, they chased her down the street! With heels, knives, and other weapons they haul-tailed down the street after Kamone. Just as she was about to get caught she jumped inside an old mans car who drove her to safety & paid for her to stay in a hotel with her siblings. I believe that this was one of the examples of suspense in the book. The suspense in this book reminds me of the book "Of Mice and Men". In this book just before one of the main characters, Lennie, is about to get caught by the angry mob of men, his friend did what was best for him, shot him! These both exhibit examples of violence, drama, sex, and the everyday life of a little girl living at the lower class in todays' society!

Ever read a book that made you scared for the main character? Well, after the set up incident Kamone pushed on with life, thinking that it would soon be over! But soon, she found what every woman wanted, a bad boy with a good heart, Lucci, who is in his early 30's. Kamone was close to death, when Lucci literally picked her up out of the trashy life she was in, and treated her like a queen. Little did Lucci know, his thug passion would not be enough to satisfy a 14 year old Kamone's lustful habits she had obtained! The only thing that Kamone had known to do with men & how to "love" them was through sexual intercourse! So of course, when she met Lucci her first emotional spark with him was the thought of sex! Though she wanted it, and bad, Lucci denied her body. Though Kamone was a caramel skinned, green-eyed beauty, Lucci said "no"! Though Kamone was basically looked at as having the body of and angel, with every curve, he denied! All Lucci wanted to do at this point wa sto help Kamone, and he even helped her to kick the need for those drugs! At this point in the book Kamone had met Lucci's in denial, crazy identical twin brother David! He though that Kamone looked like his mother, that he had killed when he was young. So he became obsessed with her! Not getting into the details, David ended up as the worst person she could have met! Tricking her into getting back into her drug addiction by faking that her was Lucci, her turned tried to turn her life back in the wrong direction. Over time, David almost killed Kamone, turned her back into a druggie, put her siblings at the dangerous hand of crack addicts, and killed her unborn child (Luccis' had to give it up some time)! I felt very scared at this moment in the book, causing my heart to shake & I trembled in my reading space! I wanted the best for Kamone at the end of the book, but I though the worst would come for her! I felt that I knew Kamone and that I could have actually been one of the characters in the book because I felt emotion!