Saturday, August 30, 2008

Tied together w/a smile

Well after an aggravating early morning for a TEST on Thursday - Friday was yet again another fun day, needless to say mostly because it started with another impressive seminar class. I felt like it was actually (even though it was only the third meeting) one of the best classes we've had thus far. I really enjoyed the different opinions and discussion that was brought up. We finished discussion Peace like a River and then were given a small introduction to Amadeus which we are starting now. As the discussion was concluding on peace like a River, there was a comment made that not only myself but a few other agreed with - that they book after completing it was quite more enjoyable than we thought. Towards the end of the book, one thing that was hit on was the fact that the writing style really seemed to make a large transition. Particularly to me - I felt like the style transitioned from more of a relaxed and flowing conversational style to a more strict straight forward style. It was pointed out that is was a lot more similar to the style of writing we saw come from Ruben's younger sister Swede; and there was also less dialog between the book's characters.

Another major point hit on in our concluding discussion for the time being, was all the different parallels that were noticeable between event in the story and the correlations they held with different instances, such as many miracles in the Bible. One of the major parallels that I had noticed and someone had actually mentioned earlier in the week in my focus group, was where in the end Jeremiah died instead of his son Ruben, and Ruben in turn was also relieved of his heath issues involving asthma. In the bible Jesus dies for us on the cross and his death allowed us to avoid that penalty of death that sin carries along with it. In turn, our gift from Jesus of life - is the parallel of the gift of life Ruben receives when his father takes on death instead. There is so much more I could hit on as we came to a conclusion for Peace like a River, but I do believe I might save my last few opinions for a rainy day.

As for the beginning of Amadeus, I really enjoy the quick language lesson Dr. Kuykendall provided on the name. AMA - is Latin for love (a romantic side) and the DEUS - is Latin for God. I found that interesting considering I definitely have NO knowledge in Latin or Greek as far as some less modern texts involve.



After ES 101 - we had some free time before we left for the lake for the majority of the day/evening. It was quite an interesting experience - we had a raft building competition, which our raft looked great, but wasn't the best in the water. The way the competition worked one girl or guy had to swim out with the raft and the other person girl/guy who didn't swim it out had to swim it back in. Well originally we had one guy one girl picked out, but this girl backed out last minute so I was selected. Now usually I wouldn't mind, however I didn't know there was going to be a lake day so I never packed a bathing suit and on top of that I have this fear of lake and ocean water .. well I wasn't able to get out of that, and kept that fear to myself but I thought I might vomit when it was time for me to get in the water - needless to say I am here though and therefore survived. There was dinner at the lake, and then when we got back to campus we had some time to chill (I worked out) and then at 9 there was an EEB event in the hanger which Amanda and I went to for a little bit, but then got so sleepy from the lake that we came back to the room and crashed! haha.



As for today (Saturday) we had group debates at 9 am and then have the rest of the day to ourselves. The only major event planned is a concert later tonight, which should hopefully be interesting. There is also a soccer game if we wish to attend which I may possibly stop by. So until next time ....

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