NOBEL PEACE PRIZE: 1997

Jody Williams and International Campaign to Ban Landmines

Today I’ll talk about Nobel Peace Prize, in particular about the person who won this prize in 1997. In ’97 this award was given to Jody Williams and to the campaign she worked for, the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL). Jody Williams is an American teacher, that worked in Mexico, United Kingdom and Washington DC. She worked for the “Nicaragua-Honduras Education Project” until 1986, and became deputy director of “Medical Aid for El Salvador”. From 1992 she worked in a new project, the ICBL. This organization signed a treaty in Ottawa, in 1997. This was an important achievement for Williams and ICBL, although United States, Russian Federation and China refrained.

The main secret of Williams’ work is the use of people power. As she said, she coordinate the work of hundreds organization, each that work independent from others. She talked with each organization about campaign planning, programs, actions… she didn’t send any letter to them, but she sent faxes to everyone, and they fax back to her. Each organization wrote faxes to her about their work, their progress and their problems. Doing this, she could see the progress of the organization from the first day of work.

The Ottawa Treaty that member states signed commits to end the suffering caused by antipersonnel mines, and the states members are agree to follow some obligations; for example they will not use, develop, produce or acquire antipersonnel mines, they’ll destroy mines and clear their territory from mines, they’ll aid mine-affected countries. I think this is very important for civilian people, that could not be involved in any war, and above all this preclude the injure of children because of mines.

This is a step forward for the peace in the world, but I’d like to remember that world powers like USA, China and Russian Federation didn’t agree with this treaty: I think Supremacy sometimes don’t get on well with Human Rights…

M

Nobel peace prize 1998

The award was established following the last will of Alfred Nobel Swedish industrialist and inventor of dynamite. The first award ceremony dates back to 1901, when were delivered the price for peace, literature, chemistry, medicine and physics. Since 1969 there is also the prize for Economics in Memory of Alfred Nobel ( even if he did not wanted it ). The award ceremony is on December 10, the anniversary of the death of the founder. Nobel invented this price because of the discomfort caused to hiself by his invention, dynamite, which had powerful implications of war. Its purpose was and still is to fund with private funds people who are more distinct in the subjects mentioned above.
In 1998 the Nobel Peace Prize was given to John Hume and David Trimble, two Irish politicians who are strongly committed to peace between Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland
Hume lived in a little town in Northen Ireland, he was educated by a catholic family and he wanted to become a priest. But after the master he stops theological studies and he decided to become a teacher, he became a politician only in 1960.
Trimble on the contrary grew in a protestant family in a town near Belfast, he studied in this towns for a lot of years. When he became Laws professor at the Queen's University of Belfalast he assisted in a shootout where one of his colleagues died, murdered by members of IRA, so he decided to commit to peace in Ireland.
These two men with their choices have risked their lives to defend the right ideals of justice and peace, and for their commitment they were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1998

Environment: problems and solutions

I ever thought that men exploit the world and its resources without any limit. We waste a lot of water, food and energy. Today water is sold by the “water companies”, and we must pay a free resource like the water, that shouldn’t be “private”. Despite this, in 2006, are died 30,000 people because of the lack of water. Nowadays, in some countries of the world, there are many conflicts because of the water. I think the water is one of the human rights. For this reason I think that the water should be distribute in a better way, and we should be reduce the waste of water too. I can do the same reasoning for the food, that we waste in our developed countries, and in others continents, for example in Africa, many people die because of the food.

Furthermore, we spend a lot of energy, too energy, and doing this we damage our planet, our home… because the planet is our house, and we should respect it as we respect our things. Today we use too non-renewable resources, like fossil fuels (Petroleum, natural gas), radioactive fuels (Nuclear energy)and metals. This is a big problem for the planet, because these types of resources will finish; moreover many of them are responsible of the pollution, jointly the big and small industries. We can solve this problem, for example employing renewable resources, like wind energy, photovoltaic energy, hydropower, and reducing the big waste of energy and resources.

M

Preserve our environment

Our envirnment is every day more in danger because we continue to pollute it with a lot of bad actions,but we don't care about it. Nothing is important if it does not concern us directly. But our world must be important. We must find a solution to preserve all, flora and fauna, water and earth. One of the temes of this last year,was how we waste water. Water is the most important thing for all forms of life, and we are including. But we are also the only that waste a lot of water uselessly. There is a very hight number of peoples that live wasting water (and these peoples live in Europe and north America). There is also an hight number of peoples who die everyday because have not enough water. This happens because developed countries continue to use the old and polluting technologies because are not as expensives as the news technologies (like the solar or the wind energy). But with choices like this everyday we lose someting that we'll need in the future. Today is water, but tomorrow could be oxygen. With cleans technologies on the contrary we preserve water and air, because they work with the power of the sun and of the wind, and with nothing else, so they don't waste nothing and they don't pollute to. We must choice forms of renewable technologies not only wind energy or solar, but also geotermic, Hydropower, only cleans technologies, we must be fast to promote it if we want protect and preserve our world.

AC/DC

As the title says this post is about my favourite band, AC/DC. This australian rock band, founded in november 1973 by brothers Angus and Malcom Young, is one of the most popular of the world. With over than 50 millions discs sold for a single album (Back in Black) they are the second artists who have sold more in all the discographic history. The name AC/DC is the abbreviation for "alternating current/ direct current" and they wanted that name because they thought that it was a very good way to explain their power. But at the beginnig they were not so famous for three years they get only some succes in Australia . Things changed with the pubblication of Highway to Hell on july 1976. But the singer Bon Scott die after the pubblication of the album for an acute alcohol poisoning. Maybe this was the worst stroke for the band. Only in 1979 they found another singer. Brian Johnson (who is the current singer). IN 1980 for memory of Bon Scott they relased the album Back in Black where there are famous songs like Hells Bells ( made for the old singer) who is the first song, or You shook me all night long, who are the top diamond songs, over Back in Black. And since that album their world popularity was written. Songs like Thunderstruck, Rock n Roll ain't noise pollution, For those about to rock, are the example of the incredible power and beauty of the Hard Rock. Not by chance AC/DC music is utilised in a lot of action movies. No one can express more power and energy.
In conclusion they are the best.

Our passions: TaeKwonDo

In this post I’ll talk about taekwondo. Taekwondo is a beautiful martial art and I start practice it in 2003.

Taekwondo comes from Korea. Tae Kwon Do in Korean means “the way, the art, of strike with feet and fists”. Taekwondo was born 2000 years ago in Korea, when the Korea was divided into three reigns: Silla, Koguryo and Paekche. In this period Koreans start to develop fighting techniques. The most important martial art that they developed was named “Taekyon”; taekwondo origins are in this ancient fighting style. Today taekwondo is divided into two federations: the WTF (World Taekwondo Federation) and ITF (International Taekwondo Federation); I practice the first, WTF Taekwondo, that is national sport in South Korea, and is the Full-contact style. Taekwondo WTF is an Olympic Sport since 2000.

Now stop with the history, I’ll tell you something about taekwondo training. Taekwondo training is very complete, because you train power, speed, endurance and various kinds of athletic ability. When I train myself I ameliorate my fighting style for taekwondo competitions. To do this I kick with various taekwondo techniques: from the kicks more simple to the difficult kicks, for example the flying kicks, that characterize taekwondo. Then I do various fights, to ameliorate my techniques, my speed and my endurance in fight. When you fight your mind is very reactive, and you must attend to the kicks in the face, they are very dangerous! You could finish your fight with a KO when you take a kick in the face. Taekwondo fighting style is characterized by the predominant use of kicks; taekwondo fighters employ in fights the fastest and most spectacular kicks. Another important part of the training is the Stretching , because it helps your legs to kick very high.

Finally I want to say that in taekwondo the most important thing is your willpower: without it, you can’t do anything.

Great Taekwondo video on Youtube

Speak - Summary

Speak tells the story of Melinda Sordino. The people of the high school avoid Melinda because she calls the cops to a house party. The reason of this was that she was raped at the party by a boy called Andy. The rape is a big trauma for Melinda, so that she becomes mute; She doesn’t tell anybody what happened to her at the party. Melinda doesn’t tell anything to her parents about the rape, but they notice her low marks. Melinda doesn’t speak to the people, and she often says only her name or “yes” and “no”. Melinda’s art teacher, Mr. Freeman, is the only person that help her. Melinda expresses her emotions and feeling painting trees. Melinda discovers an unemployed storage in the institute, that becomes her secret room, where she paints her emotions and demons. Melinda write to Rachel, the girl starts dating Andy, the truth about the party. Rachel doesn’t believe Melinda’s story about the party, but she talks with Andy about Melinda, and he becomes angry. Andy finds Melinda in her closet. He wants to hit Melinda. Melinda fight with him, and finally she subdues him. So Melinda finds the courage to pass her fear, and tells the truth about the party, finding the courage to speak. This story, wants to say that you must found the courage to speak to solve a problem, and becoming mute is not a good solution.