Works Cited

Satrapi, Marjane. Persepolis The Story of a Childhood. The United States: Pantheon Books, 2004. Print.

Satrapi, Marjane. Persepolis 2: The Story of a Return. New York: Pantheon, 2004. Print.

Hwang, David Henry. “The Sound of a Voice.”  Class Reader. 39-56. Print.


Hwang, David Henry. “Trying to Find Chinatown”  Class Reader. 61-65. Print. 

A funny incident

Marjane's family was returning home from a party, after the siren alert wailed. Her father was driving his car when he got stopped by the police. They were checking on Marjane's father, suspecting him of drinking alcohol. They even commented on how he dressed, like a Westerner, which might have made them more suspicious that he had been drinking or have possession of alcohol. They even followed the family's car to get to Marjane's house so that it could be searched for any traces of alcohol. Fortunately, Marjane's grandmother had devised a plan to trick the policemen, which is to pretend that she had diabetes and had to drink a syrup or else she would faint. The policemen believed her and let her and Marjane enter the house first. They disposed all the alcohol that was in the house and even used air fresheners to eliminate the smell of alcohol. Marjane's father then went into the house without the policemen. He said that bribing was all it took to get them to not get into the house. He also seemed to be disappointed that all his alcohol was gone as a result of this incident. I find this situation funny because of the methods they used to avoid unnecessary trouble with the policemen. I am impressed with the wit that the family had that managed to prevent the family from getting into any trouble with the authorities.

The Rebellious Marjane

In Marjane's adolescence, she liked to rebel against the strict Islamic government. She did not like the fact that she had lost the freedom that she used to had before the Islamic government ruled Iran and still went against the rules anyway whenever she had the chance to. For example, she wore Nike and Denim Jacket when she went out, which were not allowed in Iran. She even bought tapes of Kim Wilde and Camel from the black market as it was illegal in Iran for a person to be in possession of those kind of tapes. She was then caught by the "Guardians of The Revolution". They were a group tasked to arrest women who were behaving not in accordance to the rules of the Islamic government. Marjane was caught for her dressing inappropriately. Marjane then tried to gain sympathy from the guardians by saying that she had a cruel stepmother that will tell her father to put her in an orphanage if she doesn’t get home. The guardians let her go in the end. I like her rebellious style because I feel that being rebellious in Iran at that point in time allowed a person to have more freedom, just like people of other countries, although it may seem to be illegal. I believe that it is good to have a balance in a society between freedom and rules. In my opinion, the Iranians were being too strict in enforcing rules, which compromises the balance between freedom and rules.

paper 5

I find it challenging to find a suitable topic for my paper. I hope I can find one soon.

Trying to Find Chinatown

A group of people were involved in performing a play for Trying to Find Chinatown. Yas and I was part of this play. Yas played as Benjamin while I played as Ronnie. There are two characters in this play, Benjamin is a Caucasian adopted and brought up by Chinese parents while Ronnie is a Chinese American. The main theme of the play was ethnicity. It is interesting to see in the play that Benjamin had wanted his ethnicity to be Chinese just because he was adopted by Chinese parents. I personally like Ronnie's style, he only cares about music, which is his passion, than to think any negative thoughts about ethnicity. This play has taught me more about ethnicity and made me rethink about how ethnicity affects humanity. I have always taught that ethnicity is not good as it is the cause of conflicts around the world. This one sided perspective of mine had been broken down upon reading this play. Reading and acting for the play inspired me to write ethnicity as a topic for paper 3 because I had wanted to delve into the positive and negative impacts ethnicity have on society.

Sound of A Voice

This is a picture of the play conducted in class. I really enjoyed the play that was performed by my hardworking classmates. I could really see the effort that all of them put in to make the performance good.

The characters of the play are a man and a woman, whom are both Japanese. It was sort of a love story. The man was a samurai and he had a mission of killing a witch. He was invited to the house of the woman, who served him tea and tried to make him comfortable. The samurai then stayed on for few more weeks. It was during this period that feelings developed into love. But the samurai became wary of the woman as he had the suspicion that she was the witch that he intended to kill at first. By this time, she fell in love with the man already. She then decided to take her own life because of her sacrificial love for the man, which resulted in committing suicide for the man because she knew he couldn't bring himself to kill her and she hoped that he could complete his mission so that he will be happy. In my opinion, the plot of the play is quite good, although my Japanese classmates commented that the play is not an accurate reflection of the Japanese culture. This is true as the playwright, David Henry Hwang, is a Chinese. But the whole class agreed that he had done a good job in writing the play overall. I personally feel that this is my favorite play of all the plays in class because I find their love story very interesting and captivating. 

Marjane's childhood

Marjane's childhood was filled with many events that made this comic an interesting book to read. I find it peculiar for a young girl like her to aspire to be a prophet so that she could help others. She was also a mischievous girl when it came to fighting for what she believed to be right. One example is how she wanted to bring her friends along to attack Ramin by putting nails between their fingers, which resembled American brass knuckles. (Satrapi 45) One defining moment of her childhood which would affect Marjane's life was meeting her uncle, Anoosh. He was just released from prison and Marjane grew fond of him. He told stories to her and gave her a swan that he made in prison, out of bread. (Satrapi 61) He was then arrested and was sentenced to execution. His last wish before he died was to see Marjane for the last time. So, Marjane went to prison to visit him. It was there where Anoosh gave another swan, which he said was the first swan's uncle. This implies that Anoosh wanted to give Marjane the two swans to represent the relationship between Marjane and Anoosh. Although her time with Anoosh was not very long and was during her childhood, she had fond memories of him throughout her lifetime. This shows the extent of how important he was in her life.

How Persepolis relates to my life

When reading Persepolis, I can relate personally to Marjane's childhood. When she was a child, she could not resist to hold her curiosity. She was very knowledgeable for a girl of her age. I remember that when I was younger, I used to be as inquisitive as her, always wanting to know everything that happens around me until I eventually learned that there are some things that are not meant for me to know. One of the most emotional part of the book in my opinion is the part where Marjane had to leave for Austria. I can totally relate to how her family and she felt when they had to be separated. I left my home country for Singapore to study when I was 8 years old. Although she left when she was at an older age than when I left my family, the feelings that were felt were very similar. For Marjane, she slept with her grandmother and cried while I cried when I was sleeping with my parents the night before I was separated with my family, while they were giving me a warm embrace which I was going to miss for a very long time. The emotional parting of Marjane's family at the airport reminds me of how my family and I felt when I first had to leave my family. It gave me a nostalgia of that emotional moment when I had to leave my family, which are the people I had known for most of my life at that time, to be in an unknown place and staying with strangers that my parents have entrusted to take care of me, just like the situation Marjane was in.

Iran-Iraq War

Joe and Lyn had a presentation on this topic. Actually, I learned about Iran-Iraq War through watching History Channel a few years ago when there was a documentary on it. It was through this that I was able to delve into the intensity of the impact the war had on the people of the people of Iran and Iraq. In the book Persepolis, the impacts that was described about the war was quite shallow. Upon reading it, I was able to see what effect the war had on a young Iranian girl. I was quite surprised too by the fact that in Iran, they used that "golden key" to lure teenagers to join the war effort. It also allowed me to put myself in her shoe and see how war devastating the war was. However, compared to what I learned through History Channel, it is different in the aspect that Persepolis is explained in the experience of a young girl whereas the documentary is explained through the point of view of historians. From the documentary, I learned that the war had extensive impacts on both Iran and Iraq. Both countries had lost many lives during the war, many buildings were destroyed and the livelihood of people were severely affected. In Iraq, the economy was so badly affected that by the end of the war, they had difficulty paying back their debt that they owe to foreign countries that funded Iraq for their war. In Iran, quality of life dropped drastically, the lives lost was substantial in number and the cost for rebuilding the country was a lot.

Class work

In my opinion, paper 3 is one of the most difficult essay I have ever written. I also find that the blog is one of the most challenging task I have ever done. I have never done such assignment before in my life. However, I do find it interesting.

Persepolis 2

The Austrian part of her life came to an end, Marjane returns to Iran and was welcomed by loads of visitors, but still felt lonely. It took longer than expected for her to adapt, with the Iranian streets named after martyrs and being filled with posters of veiled women. (Persepolis 2, pg. 96) Marjane fell into a deep depression, attempted to commit suicide twice but failed on each try.

She then decided to take matters into her own hands, getting a makeover and taking on aerobics. (Persepolis 2, pgs. 119-121) In April 1989, Marjane attended a party where she met Reza, “the man she would marry 2 years later.” (Persepolis 2, pg. 124) In September 1989, Reza and Marjane started college, reminding them that while unmarried, they cannot publicize their relationship at school. (Persepolis 2, pg. 138)

During the regime, laws were strict, and many youths having been imprisoned for it, Marjane and people of her age resisted in subtle ways, such as by wearing make-up, showing their wrists, or listening to Walkman. (Persepolis 2, pg. 148) Even her college arts class no longer allowed nudes to be drawn, and as a result Marjane and her classmates were drawing veiled women. (Persepolis 2, pg. 145). To live a life as normal as possible, they “partied almost every night.” (Persepolis 2, pg. 152)

The Guardians of the Revolution would still sometimes catch them and throw them in jail, but Marjane’s parents would bail them out (so much so that they actually get used to it after a while!).

Sadly, there was one night when things did not go as expected, when the party was busted, the boys got up on the roof to run away and Farzad, one of the boys, fell off one of the buildings and died. (Persepolis 2, pg. 155) In 1994, Marjane and Reza got engaged but within a month their marriage deteriorated. After this episode, Marjane’s dad got her new books and she spent time with an older crowd of people, always aiming to educate herself. (Persepolis 2, pg 173)

Marjane and Reza were approached by their professor for being the top 2 students, and they were assigned a project to work on together.

They were both so into the project that they put their differences aside and didn't “even fight once.” (Persepolis 2, pg. 174) Marjane’s story concludes with her announcing her divorce from Reza to him and to her parents, and her decision to go to France in September ‘94, but this time for good. It was also one of the last few times she got to see her grandmother, who died a few years after. (Persepolis 2, pg. 187)

First post

The Martian
The movie is very good and this is my first time watching a movie about a spaceman on mars!

Here's the trailer to the movie:

An interesting movie poster :)