Essay Week 6: Life With Brooke

This week has had its mountains and valleys. I have felt overwhelmed with this class and work, but I have also had great experiences in my daily routine. In my Languages Across Cultures class, I had my first exam, which I did all pretty well on. I was hoping for an A, but a high B will do!

The storybook assignment for this class is a long-winded one. You have to delve deep into your creativity to develop a story from scratch that is inspired by other stories and fits into your overall theme. I finished the first storybook post this afternoon, so that feels nice to have it completed and turned it.

In regards to the UN-Textbook readings, I really enjoyed the Nigerian Unit I picked for this week. I wanted to start reading more stories about animals, so this unit delivered that request. One of my favorite stories was, “How the Tortoise Overcame the Elephant and the Hippopotamus.” This story actually played a part in the decision of what animals I wanted to discuss in my first storybook post. 

(Elephant - Photo by: Promios)

I was telling stories with my fiancé the other night, so naturally I had to tell him about some from this class. One of those was “Why the Moon Waxes and Wane.” Both of these stories I’ve talked about stuck with me because they were clever and witty, but easily understandable. The story about the moon reminded me of the children’s story The Giving Tree, which might be one reason I liked it so much. The old lady in the story was similar to the young boy in The Giving Tree book.

There was a continuum of stories within the Nigerian Unit, from different animals to tricksters to the lesson of hope.

My other classes have been pretty easy this week. For my human relations class, we are discussing the idea of discrimination and how we perpetuate the problems. I gained insight to the ideas of racism and classism when I visited a homeless shelter last week. It is a topic that has been coming up in my home group and in my personal life as well. Our home group actually invited a homeless man to eat with us at Denny’s last night at 11:00 p.m.