Sunny-How the first evaluation went..

I think the first evaluation turned out to be real hard. I was kind of shocked after getting the test sheet because there were a lot of things to write and I was doubtful whether I could finish in time. As I tried to write the short answer questions as specific as possible I almost ran out of time and had to write the essay real fast. I guess the essay questions were the trickiest. Because I had to analyze the paragraph by my own and was not confident of my answer. Also I had to think instantly and correctly at the same time! Gosh, My head was about to explode. Fortunately I did not miss any questions but I was answering in a rush and now I can hardly remember what I wrote;;

Page.200~250(My experience)-Jessie

As I read through page 200~250, there wasn’t such a part that grabbed my mind except one scene. Since the beginning of the book, the man has taken a good care of his son with his best. Every time they were in danger, or when the boy needed protection, his father was always there, performing his duty as a guardian. At the end of this chapter(or whatever you might call it), the boy gets sick for the first time, which gets the man into a great depression.

He held him all night, dozing off and waking in terror, feeling for the boy's heart... He pressed his hand to his forehead, conjuring up a cool forehead. You have to stay near, he said. You have to be quick. So you can be with him. Hold him close. Last day of the earth. (Page.247~248)

I am not sure about the last sentence that I quoted. Last day of the earth... Maybe it means that the man took care of the boy with all his heart as it was the last day of his life. It reminded me of all the illness that I had and memories of my mom and dad staying right next to me, nursing and being worried about me.
I was really weak and fragile when I was young. Everybody admitted that fact, and that made my parents anxious. Every single time I caught a cold, I had such a high fever, and once I had to check into a hospital for a medical care. My mom stayed up all night long just for me. How immature was I? I insisted on my mom reading books to me as I fell asleep and now I know that it might have made her more tired... But maybe that's what has made the relationship between my mom and me a lot closer. I remember all of those heart-warming nights.
It's not only when I was so young. I've had anemia(which I still have), and sizzling sun has always been a problem on me. I can't stand the heat of the sun, and summer is sometimes an obstacle since outside activities are limited to me. It was the summer of 2005, and the weather was fine "as a summer day", which means it was burning hot. It was a field day of my elementary school, and I had so many things to do that day, such as having a race on the track as a representative of our class, dancing, and so on. Therefore, at the end of the day, I wasn't myself. I overused my energy, and I passed out, and when I woke up, I was at home. My mom and dad had carried me from school to the house. I was so touched and every part of my body could feel their love. I'll never forget that day... How impressive that day was... Nobody would know.
Because I haven't been so healthy so far, there are more episodes about being nursed by my family. My aunts, uncles, and even my younger brother had taken care of me, and I am so happy to have them around me as my precious family. I can say that the boy is really lucky to have a father like that. He will remember the day that his father showed his deep, deep love. I know that. I thank for the man for reminding me how important and lovely my family is.

Unique, Respond to the Book, p.252~287

Sorry being late ㅠㅠ I forgot to bring the book home last week so I couldn't write a post on the weekend. Fortunately, I had read to the end when I was reading last week's part, 200~252, and that's how I can sit here to write a post :)


1. p259

Just help him, Papa. Just help him. He was just hungry, Papa. He's going to die.
He's going to die anyway. /He's so scared, Papa.
The man squatted and looked at him. I'm scared, he said. Do you understand? I'm scared.
The boy didn't answer. He just sat there with his head bowed, sobbing.
You're not the one who has to worry about everything.
The boy said something but he couldnt understand him. What? he said.
He looked up, his wet and grimy face. Yes I am, he said. I am the one.

Umm, some might think that the man is not behaving here, but well, I think the man is doing an understandable thing. Of course, the man left the thief to die when he didn't really need to. But what the thief did to the man and the boy is devastasting enough to kill them eventually. Imagine the shock and despair the man might have felt when he found out that they were robbed! If you don't have any supply on the road in this world, then you die. The man got so upset that he did the same thing, which is letting one die on the road, to the thief, and it makes sense to me quite a bit. Even if it's not a good man's thing to do, it's still what typical man of this world would do.

And the boy saying that he is the one to worry about everything made me be more sure that the boy is a special one. He's like Jesus, who took over all the sins of human race and died for them. The boy is a pure and sacred sprit who sympathizes with others' agony and pain. ... But a minute ago, writing the quote up there, I imagined that maybe, the author wanted to say something there, that we should all take care of each other. The boy does not need to be a special figure. The author could have wanted to say that the boy's worrying all the things is a right thing to do and we should follow him. Even if the situation that surrounds us is terrible, we should not be selfish, we should keep listening to others' words.


2. p262, 266

He needed vitamin D for the boy or he was going to get rickets. (p262)

He took a clamp from the kit and caught the needle in the jaws and locked them and set about suturing the wound. He worked quickly and he took no great pains about it. (p266)

Reading these, I thought that maybe the man had been a doctor. I had suggested that he might have been one, but well, at that time, I was not sure, and most importantly, there was the man's saying that he is not a doctor. However, this time, I think that the possibility increased. How could the man know that if you do not take enough vitamin D, you get rickets? How could he suture the wound with the needle so skillfully if he hadn't been a doctor? ... Yeah, it's not an important thing, whether he was a doctor or not, but still, it interested me :)


3. p275

He turned and looked at the boy. Standing with his suitcase like an orphan waiting for a bus.

It's a foreshadowing, isn't it, the boy looking like an orphan? It foreshadows that the man will die and the boy will be left alone...

4. p278, 283

You have to carry the fire. / I dont know how to. / Yes you do. / Is it real? The fire? / Yes it is. /Where is it? I dont know where it is. / Yes you do. It's inside you. It was always there. I can see it. (p278)

How do I know you're one of the good guys? / You dont. You'll have to take a shot. / Are you carrying the fire? / Am I what? / Carrying the fire? / Yeah, we are. (p283)

Carrying the fire appeared again~ It is the momentum of the boy's life. His purpose of life is to carry the fire. And he has the fire in him. I think that means the boy is carrying humanity with thim. The fire is the heritage of human race and I think that is humanity. And it's not only the boy who carries that fire. Everybody, Every human being does. So it's important for us to keep living. We need to keep living, keep carrying the fire and deliver it to the next generation.

Carrying the fire is also used to distinguish the good guys from the bad guys. I don't know whether the guy the boy met and followed really understood what the boy is saying, but still, he agreed that he's carrying the fire and that drove the boy to follow him.


5. The ending.

I like this ending. Of course, it's not the happiest ending we can have, because the man die (!!) but still, considering the situation, it's a happy ending. The boy won't die, at least. He met a new group to follow. He won't stick to the death body of the man, but he will continue to carry the fire. He will keep his journey and that's what makes the novel a happy one.

last review on THE ROAD

There are 3 person in my head when I think about the boy. He has very unique characteristic and is not much revealed in the story.

259pg
You're not the one who has to worry about everything.
The boy said something but he couldnt understand him.
What? he said.
He looked up, his wet and grimy face.
Yes I am, he said.
I am the one.

1) This part actually made my hair stand because it was exactly the same dialogue I had with my friend if only looking at this part and not looking at the upper part or the background. She loves sticking her nose on others' business and this sometimes got on my nerves. Therefore, I quite understand the feeling the man would have had when the boy tried to help most of the strangers they approach. The reason I said that my friend exactly resembles the boy in only that part of the dialogue is because she might not often have good intention for being interested in others :p While the boy wants to help others, she just wants to know all about the world around her. She's curious creature haha. Still, she helped me and her close ones a lot and because of her interest in others, she was one of the best people to talk to when I had something to decide or bothering me. She had quite different personality this way but now I think it helped us to become one of the best friends.

259pg
He's not gone, the boy said. He looked up. His face streaked with soot. He's not.
What do you want to do?
Just help him, Papa. Just help him.
The man looked back up the road.
He was just hungry, Papa. He's going to die.
He's going to die anyway.
He's so scared, Papa.

2) If I were to change this dialogue, it would be like this.
-> What do you want to do?
Just leave it. Leave it alone.
My classmate sitting next to me looked at his desk.
It doesnt bother you at alll. It's going to die.
It's going to die anyway.
It's scared of you.

There was once a mayfly-like bug on my partner's desk and he tried to play with it. However, it was really bothering. Although I'm not a great fan of insects, the idea of killing it or especially torturing it disgusts me. Especailly after reading Franz Kafka's 'Die Verwandlung', I had somekind of feeling that insects actually have perception.

255pg-260pg
I wasnt going to kill him, he said. But the boy didnt answer.
They rolled themselves in the blankets and lay there in the dark.
He thought he could hear the sea but perhaps it was just the wind.
He could thell by his breathing that the boy was awake and after a while the boy said:
But we did kill him.

3) The boy kind of creeped me out this part. However, except the part above, the boy pretty much showed saintlike personality. I couldnt be sure with all the parts in the story but I had impression that the boy is similar to the baby Jesus. Of course they are both young, and the way the boy tries to help others by giving out some of his shares it is similar. Also, through out the story, mention of carrying the fire seems to have some kind of connection too. Like Jesus, himself being a connection of people and the God, the boy also seems to be connecter to survivors as the boy is one of few, or only one who still contains purity.

Week 6 Vanessa- three insightful questions

Yeah! We finally finished reading ‘The Road’. I’m just so happy by the fact that I actually read all the text in the book and understood at least the important events. I expected the story to end that way because there were some spoilers among us (too bad!), anyways I’m just so glad that the little boy met someone whom he can trust and went on to continue his journey.

1. On page.259 there is a phrase where the little boy says he himself is the only one who cares about everything. At the first glimpse I didn’t think this phrase is somewhat important or crucial to the theme of the story but as I thought about it, there were some insightful meanings in this phrase. So why did the little boy say something like that? My answer to that question is that the little boy perceived his father as not a very warm-hearted person (now that they are in harsh condition) and thought he himself was the only one to save other people stranded on the road. The little boy saw his papa not helping other strangers on the road and not opening his heart toward them. Even though as a reader of this book, some people might think that the man’s attitude toward other stranded people on the road is somewhat reasonable because it is just for survival, the little, warm-hearted boy’s mind doesn’t quite understand that situation and only looks on the outer side of his father. Another reason why the little boy says he is the only one who has to worry about everything is because the boy already knows from happenings that other survivals on the road cannot care for others. For example the boy saw people eating each other, which was a big shock to him. From those circumstances the boy is quite sure that other people on the road do not have the heart to care for everything in the world. I can also assume that the boy is really frustrated and disappointed by that fact. There’s basically no one that he can rely on and he might feel some kind of a heavy duty to understand everything in the world and help the world recover from that great depression.

2. On page 260, on the second paragraph the last sentence says ‘But we did kill him’. The little boy says this after they encounter a man who stole their cart full of supplies and got them back by threatening the stranger with the flaregun. The stranger wasn’t physically killed so he just went away, but there is a question to why the boy said ‘But we did kill him.’ I think we can understand that sentence better when we consider ‘being killed’ as in mentally getting hurt. After the man and the boy got their cart back and left the stranger on the road, even though it was them surviving from another danger, the little boy was really upset. He knew that the stranger was hurt in his heart. The little boy understood the stranger’s feelings and probably thought ‘how would I feel if I were in that kind of a situation?’ This thought made him say that the stranger was mentally hurt by the man and the boy trying to scare the stranger away. This also directly relates to the first question I asked about the boy being the only one to understand everything in the world. The little boy always kept in his mind that he is the only one that cares for others no matter who they are, so he wanted to understand and sympathize with the stranger’s situation and his feelings. From this it is clearly proven that the little boy is someone who cares for everyone like God.

3. Lastly on page.268, the man and the boy are talking to each other and the man suggests to tell his son a story but his little boy sharply pointed out that ‘We’re always helping people in the stories but we don’t help people.’ It just means that the boy knew that they don’t act the same way with the behaviors of themselves in stories. What can we figure out from this? I can assume that the little boy had the intension of motivating his dad to help other people on the road by saying this ironical phrase. The boy probably figured out that if he said this, his dad would somehow be really ashamed of himself and feel sorry for not showing his son the best of him. Or it could just be the boy expressing his sudden anger and internal feelings of wrath. The boy is not happy with their behaviors, avoiding the others on the road, not even thinking of taking them along their journey. Some other thing I could figure out from this phrase was that the little boy, knowing that the reality does not exactly fit with the imaginary story, lost his childlike innocence and already overcame the reality of the world. It makes readers kind of sad by the fact that the little boy feels something that he shouldn’t have felt so early at that kind of age.

Seora-Writing 3 insightful moments

p. 259
What do you want to do?
Just help him, Papa. Just help him.
The man looked back up the road.
He was just hungry, Papa. He's going to die.
He's going to die anyway.
He's so scared, Papa.
The man squatted and looked at him. I'm scared, he said. Do you understand? I'm scared.
The boy didn't answer. He just sat there with his head bowed, sobbing.
You're not the one who has to worry about everything.
The boy said something but he couldn't understand him. What? he said.
He looked up, his wet and grimy face. Yes I am, he said.
I am he one.
This part of the book is when they catch the thief who was stealing all of their stuff. The boy hopes to just leave him but the man insists on taking all of his clothes and leaving him with nothing just like he was doing to them. However, because of the boy, they came back to him, to give him his clothes and his stuff back but he was gone.
We could make a lot out of this part of the book. The first question is that, are they really the "Good man,"? I mean, we all know for sure that the boy is, I'm just wondering if the man is. I think that he only becomes a "Good man" after considering the possibilities of how it will affect the boy. And when it comes to the boy, the man will do anything. He didn't have to take all of his stuff just like the boy said. If he really was a good guy, he would take mercy on him just like the boy said.
Also, the part where the boy says that "I am the one". We know that he has grown up from the start of the book, physically and mentally. In the beginning, he was more like under the protection of the man, but in the end he was protecting and guarding the man. And he acknowledges that he has to make a difference since his dad would care nothing more than the safety of his own.
p.265
See if you can find the first-aid kit, he said.
The boy didn't move.
Get the first-aid kit, damn it. Don't just sit there.
This is where the man got shot by an unknown man who was watching them from the house with an arrow. He was bleeding badly in his leg but he manages to stitch it himself and walk to the south.
I thought that this part was impressing since he was cursing at the boy. I know that this is a situation where he was hurt and he couldn't think clearly but unlike the beginning of the book, I could recognize a lot of cursing of the man in front of the boy. I can't really tell why for sure but I do know that the man is becoming more harsh and cold-hearted. It's mostly because of the feeling that he will soon leave his boy and he wants the boy to become more stronger, and he doesn't give too much of attention to the boy than he did in the front. Not in a bad way, but in good ways where he respects the boy's feelings and allows him to stand on his legs.
p.270
I want to be with you.
You can't.
Please.
You can't. You have to carry the fire.
I don't know how to.
Yes you do.
Is it real? The fire?
Yes it is.
Where is it? I don't know where it is.
Yes you do. It's inside you. It was always there. I can see it.
This is where the man feels deep inside his heart that this is where he's going to die, and he tells the boy to go on to the south without him. But the boy keeps telling him that he wants to be with his father and that he can't leave him, but the man convinces him by saying that he is the one carrying the fire inside his heart.
From the middle of the book, there has been some talks about them being the good guys since they are carrying the fire. We could connect this fire with the fire in the Bible. There are lots of fire in the bible, and they could all be translated into different meanings. But the best translation of the fire in the bible that connects well with the fire in the road, was the meaning of "saying". In the bible, it says that the fire means the words of the God, and whoever listens to it and senses it will feel the burning of their soul. He wants, no, maybe the man knows that he will make a difference in this devastating apocalyptic world.
Finally, this is the end of "The Road". Wow... ㅋㅋㅋ

Tracy-Assignment

Almost the first time I've ever done this on time, yay.
The end of The Road!! I’m really sad that the father dies, but at least the boy lives. With people he doesn’t know whether they are good or not. But anyway he’s still alive.
Again, I’ll be focusing on father-son relationships. I guess not relationships, since it’s just one relationship.
From page 256 to 258, there is the man threatening the other man who stole their stuff.
(I can’t write it here because that alone would probably take at least two hundred words so I’ll just write some parts of it.)
Back. More.
He stepped back again.
Papa? The boy said.
Be quiet.
He kept his eyes on the thief. Goddamn you, he said.
Papa please don’t kill the man.
The thief’s eyes swung mildly. The boy was crying. (p.256)In the end the father didn’t kill the man. But the way the father was going, I think he might have killed the man. But he didn’t, and he listened to the boy.

And they set out along the read south with the boy crying and looked back at the nude and slatlike creature standing there in the road shivering and hugging himself. Oh Papa, he sobbed.
Stop it.
I cant stop it.
What do you think would have happened to us if we hadnt caught him? Just stop it.
I’m trying. (p.258)
At the start of the book the boy would have been mad and wouldn’t have spoke to the man. But the boy tries to understand his father, why his father acts the way he does.
I think both the man and the boy are trying to understand and be good to each other.

What about dreams? You used to tell me dreams sometimes.
I don’t want to talk about anything.
Okay.
I don’t have good dreams anyway. They’re always about something bad happening. You said that was okay because good dreams are not a good sign.
Maybe. I don’t know. (p.269)
The man is unsure about what he thought before. The man used to think good dreams were not a good sign, but now he’s not sure. Good dreams are not signs: I think this is pretty negative, and that he’s changing to be more positive.

And the saddest part… I almost cried while I read this.
No chances. Do you hear?
I want to be with you
You cant.
Please.
You cant. You have to carry the fire.
I dont know how ot.
Yes you do.
Is it real? The fire?
Yes it is.
Where is it? I dont know where it is.
Yes you do. It’s inside you. It was always there. I can see it. (p. 278-279)Carrying the fire was one of the conditions of the good guys. So the man is saying that the boy has to live, being a good guy. And the boy is a good guy. By the way the man’s saying the fire is inside you, I guess carrying the fire would be acting like the boy: sacrificing ourselves for the benefit of others.

I am sad this book is over… I hope I have the courage to read this difficult book again.