"Almost Home" (1)

Almost Home by Kevin Ryan and Tina Kelley is a very introspective and depictive book describing the real - life scenarios of teenagers just like us who have been born into underprivileged families and live in poverty. Each Chapter serves as a small book in itself, telling the lives of several teenagers - their background, what their families do, and how they manage to get through their difficult lives. So far, I have a read about a boy named Paulie, who grew up in a broken home, but worked up the motivation to become a champion kickboxer and cook despite his challenges at home. He lives in a trailer in Palmer, Alaska, where the weather is always cold and earthquakes are frequent. His father, Hank, left him and his mother to become a crab fisherman on the Bering Sea, leaving them without a job or source of income. To pass the time, Paulie practices kickboxing and cooking in addition to spending time with his younger siblings, trying to make the most of their situation.
Up to this point, the book seems very surreal. As teenagers living in a community like Maplewood / South Orange, I think we sometimes forget there are people just like us living like this. It definitely puts things in perspective and makes me realize all I have to be grateful for in my life.

Journal Entry #6

This post is about the last few chapters of A Night to Remember. After the agonizing and horrific experience of witnessing the Titanic sink, the few remaining passengers on the lifeboats were left waiting and hoping for a rescue. One passenger explained, "Over a radius of four or five miles, 18 little boats wandered about through the night or drifted together on a sea as flat as a reservoir." After a night of many brutal hours both fighting for their own survival as well as listening to the screams and cries of the passengers left behind, Titanic passengers could only wait. By mid - morning the next day, The Carpathia, after receiving a distress call from the Titanic, raced full steam ahead towards the Titanic, hoping to rescue any survivors. The ship had sped through the same ice fields that sank the Titanic, risking their own lives and crew to save others. When the ship finally came, passengers cried out tears of joy, hardly believing that they had made it out alive. The scene aboard the Carpathia for the passengers was warm and welcoming. After being lifted on board by lines off the side of the ship, the passengers' names were written down and they were quickly given warm meals and blankets. A few nights later, the Carpathia docked in New York City on April 18th, 1912. Survivors were greeted with an enormous crowd of both the public as well as press, wanting to receive all the information they could. To sum it up, this book was a very interesting read, and I highly recommend it.

Journal Entry #5

A Night to Remember by Walter Lord is coming to an end at this point. The scenes depicted in the last few chapters of the book are very difficult; all of the survivors recall what occurred inside of the life boats. This included many things, but to them the worst was, despite knowing they might make it out alive, feeling the guilt that they were the lucky few, and for each one of them there were many more who wouldn't make it. Graphic scenes by the survivors recall bodies of countless passengers, still and lifeless, floating in the water, and making a desperate attempt to find anyone who survived the freezing water. One passenger described the water as "a thousand knives stabbing every part of your body." These few chapters are underlines by the fear that the passengers experienced when trying to row away from the ship as it was sinking. The pull of the ship as it sank downward into the water would pull anything remotely near it meters below, which passengers knew would be fatal. Fortunately, all of the lifeboats managed to row away in time.
After the ship sinks, the mood inside of the lifeboats becomes sad, quiet, and mournful. However, the next morning, the lifeboats pick up again, and the moods inside of the boats lifted. One passenger even said it "reminded him of a bloomin' picnic!" Despite this optimism, another passenger recalled, "As the cries died away, the night became strangely peaceful. The Titanic, the agonizing suspense, was gone. The shock of what had happened, the confusion and excitement ahead, the realization that close friends were lost forever had not yet sunk in. A curiously tranquil feeling came over many of those in the boats." Overall, I'm interested to see how long it will take for the passengers to be rescued and their reactions when it does happen.