Immigration project reflection

Immigration project reflection

This semester I choose to read the book a long way gone by Ishmael Beah. I wanted to read this book because it was about a topic that I wanted to learn more about. I think that a long way gone was a really sad book. It really brought up some Important but sad issues in the world right now. I am happy with my book choice because even though it was sad I really liked it. It had a great story and it helped me to open my eyes to issues around the world.
The book a long way gone was about a boy names Ishmael Beah. He was a child soldier he was forced by the corrupt government to kill innocent people. He was never the kind of kid to want to kill so it really affected him when he was forced to kill people. I learned about how corrupt the government can be and how it can force children to kill other children. Sometimes when I was reading the book I would be in a place that I couldn’t have access to a computer so I would have to try to rush and write it so I could finish it on time. And other days I wouldn’t be able to be home until late so I think that they should be posted by 12:00 not 9:00 because a lot of people go to bed later than that.
I think that it would be easier if our lit circles should be written because it easier to read and explain that way and people don’t always have access to computers and it feels rushed because we have to get it done by a certain time. I think that it would be easier if it was not on the computer.
Sometimes the books were really confusing and I think that it would be fun if we were able to choose the book we wanted instead of having to choose from some that the teacher provided. Not that the ones that the teacher provided weren’t good. It’s just that we had no idea what the looked like or how many pages they were.
I decided that for my art piece I wanted to make my interpretation of the book. I thought that that would be a better way to express the feelings I had for this book counting on that the book was really emotional and touching. I wanted a way to show and express the anger and sadness in the book and I didn’t think that I would be able to with any of the other ways like a book cover. With the book cover I didn’t think that it would be right because I was planning on making something depressing and sad and I didn’t want to create an art piece for the cover of a book that would discourage people from buying the book.
Since this book was about sad things I thought that it would be good to make it really dark. This is why I made the whole background dark and made it look like the painting was on fire. People usually associate fire with death and darkness so this is why I choose that. When I was first making my art piece it looked horrible. Compared to how my drawing with colored pencil looked. It looked absolutely horrible. I hadn’t put the paint on think enough so his skin looked like it was odd and slightly green. But after the paint had dried I made a second layer and after that I looked better. I just kept messing with it until It looked like how I wanted it to look. When it finally looked how I wanted it to I stopped messing with it because I didn’t want it to end up looking bad. But all in all I liked how it turned out. It looked dark, sad and scary and that’s exactly what I wanted it to look like.
I think that I could have spent more time on my art piece. I know that I could have been neater and more organized. I think that I could have used smaller brushes because sometimes when I used a big brush it would get paint in places where I didn’t want it. I wish that we could have had more time to do what we wanted with our paintings.
I interviewed a friend of my fathers. She is Indian. It was fun interviewing her because I honestly wanted to know what she had to say about some of the questions I asked her. I think that the idea to interview someone 3 times and in 3 different methods is a good idea because that way you get more comfortable talking to that person so when you have your final interview it isn’t awkward. My interviewee was born in Nellore, India. In India it is very different everything if family oriented. To say thank you to someone you have to go up to them so you are face to face and say thank you. Otherwise you are considered rude. I see that immigrating to another country can be really scary at tines because if you do not know the language it is hard to find someone to talk to and you can become lonely. I’m hoping that when I give my interviewee her gift she will appreciate it because it took me a lot of hard work to make it.